Book of Monsters
by author-self-insert
Summary: A depressed woman stumbles upon a dead body while reeling from a friendship gone awry. She's warned off the investigation by the lead detective, but nevertheless finds herself pulled into the mystery as she begins to lose her sense of the difference between fantasy & reality. There's also noir, Gnosticism, Buddhism, NeoPlatonism, a dash of Existentialism, & a Tulpa. HEA B/E
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: Meyer owns all.**

Chapter 1

The drought ended the night that Bella Swan fell from the station platform. The rain washed her blood from the rails.

The official report said that it was an accident, but there were hushed whispers of suicide. Mean-spirited gossips spread rumors of a broken engagement, but I know better.

Imagine it, Isabella, a spinster, at long last in-love, and about to be married. I ask you, is that the kind of woman who throws herself in front of a train?

It's a tragedy, is what it is, to think of her life being taken in such a cruel fashion.

I can just picture her betrothed, Edward, alone in the mortuary, bidding his last goodbyes to the corpse (because it's only fitting that the body somehow escape mangling well enough for him to hold her hand and kiss her cheek).

It's not enough that she's dead, either. Those rumors of her seeking her own destruction just draw fresh blood again and again, the vile insinuations leading Edward to wonder if she really did leave him on purpose.

And it is her fault in a way.

Dumb bitch didn't notice anyone following her—preoccupied and dizzy as she was with happiness.

I can imagine that. Happiness.

I can see her waiting on the station platform for the train to pull in, the feather in her tall hat bobbing in the breeze as she pulls out one of those round pocket watches on a chain in order to check the time. No, she's not a hipster. This here daydream is steampunk, if you please.

He will have waited on the platform too, a step or two behind. Not Edward. No. James.

A shrill horn will have announced the train's approach, plumes of smoke racing alongside the engine. People will have surged forward, eager to board. She might have felt a hand on the small of her back, fingers grazing the fabric of her dress in an intimate caress just above the top of her corset. A sharp shove would have been all that was needed to send her stumbling off the platform and onto the tracks.

Unfortunately, my daydream is interrupted mid-train whistle by the sound of my brother stirring around outside, the noise of his muttering coming right through the thin fabric of my tent.

I have to swallow the tears down—this daydream always makes me cry. I hate that the story has to end there, that I can't find a way to bring Bella back from the dead. If Meyer could get Jacob to rescue her from a watery grave after jumping off a goddamn cliff, why can't I save her from a measly train wreck?

But it's a train wreck of a day already. I've been sweating inside my sleeping bag.

There isn't enough room inside the tent to dress comfortably but I hear the click of the lighter and know that my brother is already trying to start a fire for breakfast. So I fumble with my clothes and emerge in all my 'don't give a shit, I'm on vacation' glory, only to trip over a tent stake and land on my hands and knees.

If V and J were here, they'd snicker at my graceful entrance, but my brother doesn't even acknowledge my presence.

He's angry that I'm insisting that we eat "camp food"—boiling water for oatmeal—instead of driving us into town for Dunkin' Donuts.

I ask him if he slept alright and he says that the ocean kept him up. I can hear the waves pounding against the shore right now and I think it sounds nice. Like it's got _kami_ , but in a good way, like raging madness that feeds you instead of sucking you dry.

I don't want to think about V and J, but I can't help remembering that trip we took to T—. I couldn't hear the ocean from our hotel room, even though I don't think that hotel was any further away from the shore than the campsite I'm sharing with my brother. The sea here (just over the dunes from our tent) is angrier than the one washing the shores in T—, which seems funny when I think about it.

Or maybe not funny but perhaps ironic.

I ask my brother if he wants to go to the shore today or if he wants to just stay by the campsite. I'm offering this so that I seem reasonable, because I know he thinks it's a lot of work to lug our beach chairs and a cooler and an umbrella and all of our books to the beach. I shouldn't be surprised when he accepts the offer to stay at the campsite—though I am—because he doesn't even like going into the water anymore. He says he's too old for boogie boards and he doesn't like swimming.

"What are you doing here then?" I ask and he says that he only came so that I wouldn't be lonely.

My twelve year old brother feels sorry for me.

Then he says that it's also the only vacation he's likely to get that summer.

So we stay at the campsite and he plays on his handheld-video-game-thing that I bought for him with my first pay check out of college. And I read.

The signal for my cell out here is dicey and I purposely left the flashdrive of all of the fanfiction I've copy and pasted into Word files at home so that I would be forced to study for Comps. It's a physical pain in my chest—that's how much I want to pull out my phone and just hope for a damn signal so that I can read some fanfiction. But I know I can't. And it's so goddamned hot and humid and it's nothing like that beach in T— (which was pretty even if it was like hell) and I can't afford a hotel room, which is why we're camping, and I hate, positively hate, this fucking book that I'm reading for my Comprehensive Exams. It's all about Late Antique Egyptian coinage—with charts and charts and charts showing weights and purities—which I don't think _anyone_ could find interesting, but I must be wrong since someone went to the trouble of writing this fucking book. You don't need to tell me— _I_ _know!_ Coinage is important from the perspective of tracing shifts in religious, political, linguistic and economic power. But the paper I'm trying to take notes on is wet with sweat—my own sweat—and the ink from my pen is running.

It's not the book's fault. I'm just broken.

When my brother says that he isn't feeling well, I jump at the excuse to go home. We're leaving three days early and it's a three and a half hour drive home, but I don't care. At home, I've got a dependable signal for my phone and a comfortable bed and air conditioning and a flashdrive full of fanfiction.

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She's pissed. Like I meant for my brother to get heat stroke.

She's hissing when she says my name, "Izzzybella," like she's pronouncing it in Parseltongue. I hate the way she says it. (To be honest, I hated my name altogether until _Twilight_ came out. Afterwards, I secretly wanted everyone to start calling my Bella instead of Izzy, but of course I've never had the guts to say anything to anyone.)

I suppose it _is_ my fault that my brother's sic. I took him on a vacation to the beach in August in the midst of a Global Warming spike (which we're now calling "climate change," like that makes a difference in the fact that it's hitting 90 in February these days).

Yet, what's done is done. What good does it do to scream at me? She's like an opera singer—she has these lungs. She can just scream and scream and scream. I can't scream at all. Even when I'm frightened, all that comes out is a pitiful croak because I can't breathe. And if I try to scream when I'm angry, I just start coughing.

I wonder again what purpose she's serving by yelling at me like this. But that's like asking why a thunderstorm happens. It's a force of nature.

My mother has _kami_. Like thunderstorms and oceans and great generals. I've tried to explain this to people but they just look at me. I say, it's a Japanese word, _kami_. It means she's got power.

They still don't get it.

Then I say that if you cut off her head there would be a lightening show, like in _The Highlander_ (I prefer the tv show) when what's-his-name MacCloud (or is it McCloud?) of the clan MacCloud (or McCloud) absorbs the life-force of another immortal (the so-called "immortality" being contingent on not getting decapitated).

People get it then, but I don't think they believe me, like they've never met someone with _kami_ , which makes sense, since "There can only be one" (according to _The Highlander_ ).

So I tell them that she's an energy vampire and they let it go—more so because I think that they don't want to talk about it anymore.

I could let them meet her, let them see for themselves. But I try very hard not to let anyone I know meet my mother. Not even V and J ever met my family—except my dad, who drove us to the airport when we went to T—.

My mom's still screaming at me (it's been half an hour at least and my eardrums are _vibrating_ ) about what I did to my brother and how could I do that to my brother. I used to think that she was serious. That these discussions (they're not really discussions, though, are they?) were actually intended as an exchange of communication (as if they followed Habermas' rules of discourse, because, yes, I think we all intuitively sense that such rules exist even if we've never heard of Habermas). But I don't think that's right. There's nothing rational about these exchanges. You can't answer a thunderstorm. You can't talk it into going away. You just have to wait it out.

Except that that's not entirely right either. She _does_ want something.

I figure it out at last. After she settles down when it comes out that she wants me to fork over money for pizza. I've already got my wallet open.

She wants to send my father to the liquor store too but I say "no, I've still got to pay rent" and she points out—snaps—that I clearly have the funds to blow on a twenty-three dollar a night campsite and gas to the shore so what's a few more dollars for a bottle of vodka?

I leave with her still screaming at me—I imagine someone reporting us to Child Protective Services because my brother has a sunburn and is sick on his stomach—and I drive home.

I feel bad for my brother. I do. But I think Child Protective Services would be a lot more concerned about his alcoholic parents (and the fact that he has to sleep on a filing cabinet jerry-rigged into a bed because of my mom's hoarding) than a sunburn.

And I also think that my brother is less upset about the heat stroke than the fact that I left him with his—our—parents.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I swear that I'm going to study for Comps, but of course I don't. I've still got thirty books left on my reading lists and only forty-five days in which to finish them before the exam.

I should finish unpacking too. I've been living in this apartment for six months and I still haven't unpacked everything.

When I first moved, I splurged for a movie poster from Otto Preminger's _Laura_. I should take it out of the canister and hang it by the front door.

I've had the DVD of Dana Andrew's _Fallen Angel_ from Netflix for the last month and I still haven't watched it. I should watch it. I've got a whole list of film noirs waiting for me to see when I finally return it. Because I still do the mail-in DVD thing. I don't believe in streaming, having that many choices just at your fingertips. It would be like happiness. Besides, my wifi's not that good.

Instead of watching movies, I spend two days in bed, the air conditioner on high. I read fanfiction nonstop and when I'm not reading fanfiction, I'm daydreaming.

I've had to give up on that daydream of Bella falling in front of a train. That was just a non-starter. I'll come back to it, I know, try to figure a way around the tragedy, like a child worrying at a loose tooth.

The new daydream I'm working on focuses on Edward. There's a train again, for some reason, though I probably shouldn't be surprised. Trains represent escape. Or maybe sex. But then everything represents sex, doesn't it?

 _Caballo Rojo didn't warrant a full stop on the train. I—_

And by "I," I mean Edward, because this daydream's EPOV.

 _I had to leap from the train while it was still in motion, and sprint for a ramshackle shed. The barren town in which I found myself, enclosed as it was by such a dry, vast emptiness, hadn't more than straggling vegetation and barely a square mile of construction. All of it too sparse to provide cover for man who needed to stay out of sight._

 _I waited until the daylight began to wane, cursing and wishing that I could force the sun to set by will alone. As soon as it was safe to do so, I fled the shed, and immediately gravitated in the direction of the church. Its rooftop cross was easy enough to pick out in the midst of so much squalor._

 _My footsteps slowed as I approached the church. I'd grown increasingly wary of such places once heaven was removed from my reach._

 _It was a plain church. Squat and simple. A false pediment rose from the front, with the cross at its peak, the sole attempt at opulence. The severity of the place, and the poverty of the surrounding town, was somehow disconcerting, though for the life—the_ un-life _—of me, I couldn't have said why._

 _I walked slowly around the far side of the church, and froze beside the jumble of gravestones standing there, gasping with disbelief._

 _There she was, perched on a small pedestal, in a clutch of graves, her arms held out as if to comfort the dead in their pain._

 _Who would have thought that such a thing could exist? I tried to calculate the odds, and gave up._

 _For there she was, my Bella, immortalized in stone._

 _Could an artist have come across my Bella and sculpted her likeness?_

 _No, the statue was centuries old. It staggered the imagination—to think that there was once another woman who encompassed my Bella's beauty._

 _I decided that it wasn't possible. It was obvious that the artist had cobbled this likeness together from the most exquisite women of his day._

 _Indeed, the likeness was almost too true, from the kindness in her expression to the gentle grace of her gaze. Her hands too, the fine fingers curved in a delicate gesture, posed to brush a burning brow, to wipe away an errant tear, they were Bella's. If only a lock of hair would escape the statue's cowl, I was sure it would curl over her shoulder just as Bella's did._

 _The statue shone out in the night, seeming to absorb the darkness and radiate it back out as light. She was luminescent._

 _I hesitated at the edge of the graveyard, reluctant to venture any closer. Even at a distance, I could feel a strange sensation gradually stealing over me. It wasn't peace. I was too far gone for anything as merciful as that, but it was a sense of calm._

 _Somehow, I found my way back to the shed before morning, my whole being rebelled against leaving the graveyard._

 _How,_ how _, could I have imagined myself strong enough to endure this?_

 _When I returned to the graveyard, I found myself hesitating again on the edge of the plot. But this time, I realized the mistake I'd made the night before._

 _The Virgin wasn't looking in my direction at all. And her features bore a distinct mark of_ disdain _._

 _She didn't really resemble my Bella at all. I'd been deluding myself._

 _What I did after that didn't make much sense. Yet even madmen have reason of a sort. It is a calculus all their own. Divine in its own way._

 _I was not entirely mad, either. Perhaps only half of me. One half of me a fool and grotesque in his drooling infamy. The other half was entirely sane._

 _I wasn't really going back, the rational half said. I just wanted to see her. I wouldn't stay. I wouldn't even let her know that I was there._

 _But the reasonable half of me was little better than a jibbering madman._

 _I ran. I ran and I ran and I ran, because the irrational half of me needed to see her again. Needed to remind itself of the reality of her features. Memorize them so that there could be no chance of repeat blasphemy._ She _was Bella and there could never be another._

That _pout,_ that _tilt of her cheek._ They _were the reason I'd left. I needed to see her so that I could be reminded that distance was a measure of my devotion. I'd go away stronger, able to endure our separation a little longer._

 _The reasonable half of me laughed at my predicament, a merry ripple of hysteria. I was a bridegroom to reckless abandon, a festering sore threatening to re-infect what should have been virgin flesh._

 _I told myself that the juxtaposition of her beauty against my own filth would be enough to remind me why I'd left. Then I could go._

 _But-ahh! Let us hear now hear now the demon's confession._

 _Because when I finally made it from Caballo Rojo to Forks—running all the way—oh, how I wanted to go to her._

 _And it_ was _her. Not some fetid imitation._

 _Joy mixed with agony and the fool inside of me knew that this—_ this _—was what madness felt like._

I haven't decided why the Edward in this fantasy gets off the train in Caballo Rojo in the first place. If it's an AU and not an AH, then maybe Edward has seen the statue in someone else's head and wants to see it for himself. Or maybe he gets off the train because he's trying to elude someone. That scenario works equally well for Vampire-ward or Escaped-convict-ward, both set in the mid- _New Moon_ bail on Bella of course.

 _NM_ rewrites used to be my favorite fanfiction. I made an excel file to rate all of the stories and the author's take on important plot points, like how long Bella made Edward work to get her back and whether Victoria got to her first.

These days, I prefer AH's, but most of them have some version of _NM_ in them. I think that you can really judge a writer by how hard she/he kicks Edward in the balls for leaving Bella like that.

I would make him really suffer.

And making a vampire go to a desert town named Caballo Rojo (I think I just like the sound of those syllables together) seems like a pretty good punishment.

Because I hate the summer. I hate the heat. I hate the sun.

Which is the real reason that I'm spending the rest of my vacation in bed. I think that I only went to the beach to spite V and J. _Assholes_. And to replace my memories of the three days that I spent on that fucking island with them (T— is a bunch of islands all lumped together into one country, but we mainly stuck to just the one island).

It didn't work. I mean, vacationing at the beach hasn't done a fucking thing to erase my memories of that nightmare. If anything, it's left me feeling like shit.

Right now the most insignificant tasks seem herculean, like going to the grocery store.

I don't want to go anywhere or do anything.

It's so hot but I don't want to turn the air conditioner any higher because my electricity bill is already so high.

I tried to explain it to V and J when they first suggested— _told_ me—that we were going to the Caribbean for vacation. I told them that I don't "do the beach." I said, "I get nauseous when it hits 80." I even joked that I had porphyria, but they thought that I was acting out. _People get depressed in the winter, not the summer_. V and J said that I was just being difficult. They never listened to anything I said.

And I _still_ feel like I have to justify myself to them. Like it's not enough that I'm spending my vacation alone in my apartment in the dark.

Though even this is better than that vacation I took with the two of them.

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I have to go back to work this morning, and I'm exhausted. I tried to stay awake all night, reading fanfiction, with the notion that I wouldn't have time for it when my vacation was over.

I turn off the alarm and try to make myself feel better by going back over Edward's thoughts when he sees the statue in Caballo Rojo for the first time. And my eyes are pricking with tears again and I don't know if it's because I'm still hurting for Edward, even if he was wrong for leaving, or if it's because I'm _here_ , in _reality_ , and I have to get up and I have to go outside and face everyone.

I fucking hate the fucking walk to the fucking Metro and the fact that I have to take a shortcut through a rotten smelling alley into the garage if I'm going to avoid everyone looking at me on the sidewalk—what the fuck is everyone's problem? why can't they keep their fucking eyes to themselves?—and the fact that it's so fucking hot at eight o'clock in the fucking morning that I've already got sweat stains like a pig.

I fucking hate the fucking Metro when it's _not_ 120 fucking degrees, and I can't help wondering if I'm actually _in_ hell already. To be honest, that would explain a lot.

I'd drive my car but the parking pass for the lot at work is four hundred fucking dollars a month. That's half my fucking rent.

When I walk into work, the angry Eastern European woman at reception says "Welcome back" and I stifle a sob. I'm not a crier. Sometimes I tear up and I have to hold my breath until I'm under control again, but I don't see the point in crying. The last time I really cried, it was at the park with V and J the day before we flew to T— and they told me what they told me.

I think back to that day and I hate myself. I hate that I fell apart like that. That I let them see what they had done to me.

I greet my coworkers and tell them that I had a "wonderful" vacation. I can't do anything about the wavering in my voice so they can think whatever they want.

I open my email and the sheer number of messages makes my chest tighten. I decide to get a cup of coffee before I start reading.

Sipping my coffee, I decide to be efficient, and sort my emails by subject line and proceed to read the most recent message in every chain. I'm able to file twenty emails that way before I begin to feel tense again.

When I'm feeling anxious like this, the only thing that helps is—

I don't like to admit it. Even to myself.

It takes everything in me not to pull up fanfiction. I know that IT tracks Internet activity and I don't want management to realize how much time I spend not doing any work. I could just angle my computer screen and sit here staring at nothing as long as I keep my hand on the mouse and no will notice—

If I daydream.

 _I asked if she knew where the statue had come from._

 _She told me that it had always been there. It was simply their Virgin._

 _Of course._

I've decided that before Edward leaves Caballo Rojo, he should get a room in a boarding house. I want to keep him there, tossing and turning in agony for a while. If it's an AU and he's a vampire, then he's burning for Bella's blood. If it's an AH and he's an escaped convict (I'll work out later how he's gotten his hands on a change of clothes and money), then he's gotten hooked on drugs in prison. Or maybe he has malaria—the kind with bouts of fevers and chills.

 _When the serving girl left me alone in my room, I laid down, trying not to breathe, not to hear, not to think. It was useless. The sense of calm that had set in when I first laid eyes on the statue faded._

 _Turning over on my side, I curled into a ball, trembling. I gasped for air, trying to ease the agony. No hunger ever burned liked this._

 _By the time that I had recovered, night had fallen._

 _I returned to the church as if by a compulsion, and hesitated again at the edge of the graveyard._

 _If anything, the Virgin's features had grown softer since I'd last seen her. Pity ghosted across her brow and a single tear appeared to have formed in the corner of her eye, on the verge of falling._

 _I swayed on my feet, leaning towards her across the space. If I didn't know better, I would have sworn that she had turned slightly during the day, angling herself a fraction of an inch to the side, as if waiting for me to return._

 _Someone as exquisite as she didn't belong in that town. I tried to imagine a set of circumstances that could have brought such a work of ethereal beauty to this backwater. It boggled the mind._

 _I tore myself away just before the sun rose. Going back to the boardinghouse, I tried to preserve that feeling I'd experienced in that graveyard, blocking out everything else._

 _It was hell._

 _The next night, I was sure of it. The Virgin was slowly turning in my direction. The hint of a smile now curved the corners of her lips. It was possible, wasn't it? After all, a creature like her could never harbor ill will, even towards a monster such as me._

 _I raised a foot and waited, ready for something to tell me that I wasn't wanted, some_ sign _that the monster—ME—wouldn't be allowed to trespass upon sacred grounds._

 _I lowered my foot slowly, bringing me a whole four inches closer to my goal._

 _I imagined the earth would open up to eat me._

 _Nothing._

 _The next night, she seemed to have anticipated my arrival, having shifted again so that her gaze met mine as I arrived at the edge of the graveyard._

 _The longer I looked, the more there was to see. Her expression was so mercurial—she hurt me at the same time as she soothed me._

 _What was it about her that was so arresting? I tried to put a name to it._

 _At the end of two more nights I thought I had it._

 _The suffering her expression engendered in my chest—the grief that I felt in response to her own obvious grief—was only what I deserved. A testament to whatever crimes I'd committed._

 _Nevertheless, there was forgiveness too. The tear in the corner of her eye was a mark of pity. Mercy._

 _And I realized then why she reminded me so much of Bella. I'd had forgiveness once and I'd thrown it all away. Bella's love had been just that. Grace._

 _This revelation left me stunned. I felt my mouth fall open and a shudder pass through my frame._ What have I done? _I squeezed my eyes shut, unable to bear the sight of the Virgin's sorrow._ Was she done with me? _I wrenched my eyes open and looked at her. She couldn't abandon me._ Please _. I began to raise a hand in supplication—she couldn't shun my touch—and flinched at a sudden burst of noise. A harsh, braying sound. The cackling of demons._

 _I spun, ready to lash out at whoever dared to intrude._

 _I saw a ragtag collection of men, women and children passing in groups. They were all dressed in shabby finery. I heard new sounds of movement in the church behind me and realized that a ceremony was taking place._

 _Already, a few of the passersby had noticed me in the graveyard and I could hear them speculating. They were curious enough of the reclusive_ gringo _who'd so strangely appeared in their town. I didn't want them to give them any more reason to suspect me. Besides, my time in the graveyard was no one's business but mine. I wanted privacy._

 _I started to leave, when I heard it again. The burst of laughter that had startled me in the first place. I looked around, trying to place the sound, and when I succeeded, I knew it—I was going mad. I_ was _mad._

 _Bella again. Alive, her veins full of blood and a smile curling up the corners of her lips when her head turned. I could only see her from behind, but it was her. She was_ here _._

 _Of course. I should have known. I had left her and she'd followed me._

 _Or no, my evil angel had set me upon her scent._

 _Again._

 _For this minion served a deity devoid of mercy._

 _Involuntarily, I found myself following this walking, breathing doppleganger. She was surrounded by laughing children, apparently leading them to the church and giggling along with them as they marched. I hung back, not wanting to intrude. Yet I could tell that she sensed my presence. She looked back over her shoulder at me more than once, before ducking her head shyly. I'd yet to see her face full on. Bella was_ there _, though, in the slope of her shoulders, the waves of her chestnut hair._

 _With another half glance at me, she darted up the two steps into the church._

 _I tried not to draw attention to myself, waiting for the other churchgoers to go inside. The woman who owned the boardinghouse where I was staying saw me and tried to convince me to join the congregation inside the church. I was as polite as I could be, gently declining._

 _The service seemed interminable. Every so often, I could hear them break out into hymn and I was able to pick out Bella's voice. That delightful chiming of bells._

 _By the time it was over, I was perched on the roof of the church, behind the bell, trying to be as unobtrusive as possible. Bella must have expected to find me waiting, however, for she came out and looked around, her shoulders dropping when she didn't see me._

 _I carefully tested the air for the first time that evening. It seemed safe enough. I inhaled a lungful and—_

 _I was confused. Something was wrong. My throat didn't burn._

 _And as if waiting for just that cue, the girl twirled suddenly, showing off her fancy dress to her companions. At last, I saw her face clearly._

 _Savage claws seemed to rake across my flesh. I almost cried out from the shock._

 _Her face was perfect. Nose, eyes, mouth, forehead, cheeks and chin, each set together in the most ideal symmetry. She was perfect._

 _But my true Bella's face wasn't perfect._

I'm shaken from my reverie when the fire alarm goes off. I'm sure it's just another damn drill but everyone's getting their stuff. The alarm is so loud that it vibrates the air.

Outside, we're all milling around in the heat—the air's fucking rippling above the asphalt—waiting for the fire department to give the all-clear. I stand off to the side under the shitty shade of a dying six foot tree pretending that I'm not staring at _them_ , the "cool kids" standing in a huddle by the entrance of the café. We're supposed to wait by the picnic tables but it's awfully buggy and that's why they're probably by the café. I know that I could join them if I wanted to. They might not want me there but they wouldn't tell me to leave.

But I just don't feel like it.

J and V don't work here anymore. So at least I don't have to endure _that_ indignity.

It's too hectic to daydream out here with everyone bitching, and even in the shade there's too much glare to read fanfiction on my phone. So I watch the secretaries bat at the mosquitos.

When we're allowed to go back inside the building, it's time for lunch. I could read fanfiction on my company computer now if I wanted to because it's my own time and I don't think the IT software is savvy enough to pick up that it's basically porn. For some reason, I don't feel like it though.

I already feel so numb. Like I'm underwater watching the world through bubbles and swells.

I know that I need to shake this off and get back to reality. I never should have gone on vacation. I needed time to study for Comps but I didn't actually do that, did I?

I decide that I need to temper this malaise with a rigorous dose of misery. Wretched though it may be, full-blown depression is preferable to this angst, this confusion. Because really there's nothing to be confused about.

A coworker asks how I'm doing and I lament that I'm still plowing through my emails, trying to catch up. She consoles me, saying it took her two whole days to get up to speed the last time she went on vacation.

When she walks away, I go straight to that treasure trove of fun facts to know and tell and misinform and plagiarize, Wikipedia, and type this into the search engine: Solitude. After all, that's what I need, isn't it? To be left alone and to be content with my loneliness.

I'm hoping to find an image of that statue in that cemetery—it's called _Solitude_ , isn't it?—and I'll print it out and prop it up next to my computer so that while I'm working my eyes can fall on it and I'll remember. A somber shot of depression embodied in a portrait or a graveyard statue. The angry Eastern European woman will huff and say it reminds her of me.

But my attention is captured by a link to an article on the subject of _Solitude_ , by which I mean the physical (and mental?) state, not the statue. I click on the link and start reading.

 _Some people claim to enjoy solitude,_ the article reads. _There are many possible reasons for this. Such a person may simply be a lone wolf_.

This makes perfect sense to me. I nod, because I don't need anyone.

 _Or they may suffer some sort of mental condition predisposing them towards avoidance._

I stare at the screen.

And not in a _staring-at-nothing-daydreaming_ sort of way.

But in a _that's-rather-disturbing_ sort of way.

It isn't the suggestion that I might not be mentally sound that gives me pause. I already know that I'm a missing a card or two from the deck.

It's the utter thoroughness with which the author of this particular article pursues the possibility. It's the _vast_ list of possible kinds of crazy that I might be, because a list is indeed provided, with hyperlinks for further information.

I click on these possibilities one by one, wondering with perverse fascination which madness is most like mine.

What a fool I am.

 _Introverted?_ I don't even quibble this one. It was one of the things I resented the most about V and J, how they were always wanting to go out. To do things together. Wasn't it enough that we saw each other at work every weekday?

 _Daydream a great deal?_ The article doesn't include a definition for a "great deal," however, and given the lack of a standard measure, I refuse to take this as a mark against me (despite the _Comment_ at the bottom of the screen from a guy named **BeerMan** : "Freeks would have more time to make friends if they didn't spend all of their time with daydreaming." _As if it's that easy. As if the daydreaming and the fanfiction are the_ cause _of anti-social tendencies when they are in fact the_ result _._ ).

 _Experience moments of dereality?_ I don't know what dereality is, but I click on the link and read the definition, and have to concede that I do indeed disassociate from reality, and quite often too.

 _Secretive?_ Desperate, now, I argue (to myself) that this not a fair question. After V and J, it is only natural that I should want to protect myself. They were always wanting to know everything about me, while at the same time claiming that they already knew everything there was to know about me. As if they could see right through my skin to my inner core. And if that was true, then what they saw couldn't be worth very much, because they certainly didn't think much of me.

I glance around the office and wonder if my coworkers realize just how crazy I am.

I prefer that they not think of me at all.

I'm sure that the empty round of amorphous social interactions that I make myself endure generates no more than a soporific cloud of inclinations—tendencies—nothing so concrete as a character by which I might be judged. _What personality?_ A mess of weak-willed uncertainty, feint-hearted pandering and contrived shows of false interest, so as not to offend. The truth: I am constitutionally incapable of bearing life and hence alternate between broken-backed feebleness and raging anger, hostility born of the knowledge that I am a failure.

And with that thought, I realize that I am out of control, clearly on the brink of mania.

I keep clicking through articles though. At one point, an advertisement for Vedic astrology flickers in the corner of one of the pages. It reminds me of V, naturally. She got a book on Vedic astrology once, and told J—

Well, does it matter what she told J?

She told me that her book said that I was an empty vessel. That others were meant to use me to fine-tune their own energies.

What kind of an astrological system tells a person that they're an empty vessel?

An empty fucking vessel?

A goddamned copper bowl?

That alone should've clued me it to what V had planned for me. I don't _want_ to be empty. I don't want to be malleable, subject to manipulation. I'd much rather be unchangeable. Terrible even. Medusa if need be.

I'm not even sure that Vedic astrology is legit. But V was Indian— _is_ Indian, because as far as I know she's still kicking—so it wasn't my place to question it, even though she claimed to be Buddhist, not a Vedic Hindu.

Not that Indians can't have astrology, either. But if they do, and it looks and sounds just like Western astrology—plus empty bowls—then I can't help feeling like someone's being taken for a ride, and I don't know if it's Indians being forced to assimilate or me being mindfucked by a psychology major (V) who's taking advantage of the fact that I like Jung (a psychologist who liked archetypes and myths and said some fucked up things about Jews that I pretend he didn't say so that I can keep on liking him).

But maybe I don't get the empty bowl thing because I'm stuck in my own cultural paradigm.

If only the bowl didn't remind me that my mother's sole reason for keeping me around is to suck me dry.

I wonder if there's a bowl sitting on V's coffee table with my still bleeding heart sitting in it.

I'm sure it's a good thing to be seen as a source of food in many cultures. Nurturing and whatnot. No one's ever complimented for it though. If anything, they say I'm a bitch. I think it's just a way for them to get me to drop my shields so that they can suck me dry.

I quickly click away from page with the astrology advertisement (V and my mother are both Scorpios, surprise surprise) and keep on clicking, a desultory miasma of text and images flashing across the screen.

 _I can quit anytime_ , I tell myself. But I keep clicking.

At last, I come across another article, this one about something called a Tulpa.

What a funny word. _Tulll-pah_. I imagine a stoned J trying to sound it out.

Apparently, Tulpas are thought-forms come to life. Tibetan monks conjure them up with their minds.

These monks are Buddhist, of course, which just makes me think of V again. I ignore that and keep reading.

Tulpas are apparently quite powerful once they're created. They even have lives of their own, carrying on their own affairs separate from their creators.

Even though monks are the ones who usually create tulpas—an artifact of meditation and a physical emanation of increasing spiritual power—anyone could make one. Anyone who tried really really really hard, that is.

This Belgian-French explorer from the early 1900s studied with the Tibetans and supposedly made her own Tulpa. Other people could see it, or so she said.

And it's apparently a big thing now. There're whole Internet communities for people who create Tulpas. There're even instructions.

There's also a Tulpa _My Little Pony_ tie-in, but that goes over my head.

Or under it.

It's kind of creepy. (The _My Little Pony_ tie-in is uber creepy, but I'm not letting myself dwell on that). I mean, creating a little friend who runs around and keeps you company is a little off-putting. They'd be in all your business, because if they're in your head, they're there ALL OF THE TIME.

I never even had an imaginary friend growing up, my daydreams (or excursions into dereality)—which I've had for as long as I can remember—being sprawling epics, the characters amorphous, blending into each other. When I found out what imaginary friends were, I wondered how a kid was supposed to tell the difference between one of these friends and a ghost. I thought imaginary friends were CREEPY.

Like Tulpas.

But now?

Countless articles later, it's an hour past the time I'm supposed to leave work. "You need to go home," my supervisor says when she interrupts, smiling at me from the doorway, the adorable little idiot. I wonder, and not for the first time, if I'd be happy with my life if I had a job that actually challenged me, that was demanding enough that I'd be in serious shit if I blew off an entire day of work.

But that's why I was going to school, isn't it? The elusive greener pasture.

I go home in a daze. A nice cushy, cloud-like daze. I eat a tv dinner and then sat on my bed with the lights out and my eyes closed.

 _Concentrate_.

How hard can it be? Surely I, if anyone, with the amount of hours I spend submerged in dereality every day, should be able to whip up an imaginary creature in no time at all.

One of the articles recommended that I decide what my Tulpa would look like before I started. This makes sense. That time my mother decided she would become a Neo-Pagan, she convinced me to do a vision quest, and I wasn't supposed to imagine what my spirit guide would look like. I was just supposed to let it _reveal_ itself to me.

It took two hours of me imagining myself in a cave for the damn thing to show up, and when he—she— _it_ did, its appearance frightening me so badly that I was jarred out of the vision (meditation, trance, whatever) and refused to ever do it again.

A part of me, a very small part, sometimes feels guilty, wondering if my poor spirit guide is still sitting in that cave waiting for me. But I sure as hell don't want it showing up as my Tulpa.

I quickly decide that I want my Tulpa to be human. Or at least to look human.

I'm self-aware enough to know that an outsider would probably think that I'm making a mistake in trying to create a Tulpa. But apparently I'm a dereality addict. I figure, in for a penny, in for a pound. And how bad can it be, really?

Besides, I know that I'm not the only freak out there. L. M. Montgomery—famed author of the Anne of Green Gables series—wrote a story about a young woman who spent all of her time daydreaming, a story that went on to inspire a _Twilight_ fanfiction, Rosybud's _Ladder to the Sun_. If the heroines of these stories can daydream, why not me?

(Ok, so yeah, these heroines eventually stop daydreaming and start living their lives, but it's not like I'm a criminal.)

And there is a kind of rightness to it, after all. The first time I heard of _Twilight_ it was in the airport leaving for that vacation with V and J.

V's name isn't really Victoria, of course. Nor is J's name really James. But the initials are right.

And this "coincidence" with the initials is significant enough that it's even made its way into my _Memoirs to Prove the Non-Existence of the World_ (a collection of the evidence—and it's mounting up—that the world is indeed not real).

It isn't difficult for me to choose a gender for my Tulpa. V was always harping about whatever (she imagined) was going on with me and J. She had no idea. He hurt me. But she ripped out my fucking heart. It will be a long time before I can trust another woman again.

My Tulpa will be a man.

I fall asleep, creating him.

 **AN:**

 **Un-betad.**

 **18 chapters of ~ 4000 words. Weekly updates.**

 **HEA. Bella/Edward.**

 **Rated M for language and subject matter.**

 **Genre: This is mystery-lite, with a dearth of evidence and investigation.**

 **WARNINGS: No rape. The main character is physically attacked at one point but the attack is not** _ **overtly**_ **sexual. There is frequent discussion of suicide, but no attempts on the part of the main character.**

 **This story discusses religion and ethnicity. I'm trying to do so in a sensitive but realistic way—which means that the characters are flawed, so they sometimes say things that are questionable. But it's supposed to be obvious from the context that what they've said isn't being condoned. If anything, this story is about religious freedom and ethnic equality. If you think that I've screwed up, please let me know.**

 **Rec:** Rosybud's _Ladder to the Sun_ How can you die when you've never really lived? That's the problem Bella Swan faces when she's told she only has a year to live. Can she make up for a lonely, unhappy life in the short time she has left... and maybe find love too? All-human, EXB. Twilight - Rated: M - English - Angst/Romance - Chapters: 22 - Words: 111,847 - Reviews: 2595 - Favs: 4,117 - Follows: 1,689 - Updated: Sep 24, 2010 - Published: Oct 31, 2009 - Bella, Edward – Complete


	2. Chapter 2

**Warning: This story includes a character contemplating suicide. If you live in the USA and need help, text "Go" to 741741 or call 1-800-273-8255. Other support services available at www dot crisistextline dot org**

 **Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephanie Meyer. Aside from references to various fanfictions, this plot belongs to me.**

Chapter 2

In this daydream, Bella wants to go to Hollywood. She's not particularly interested in doing the tourist thing, though. She wants to direct movies.

I've come up with this contest (hosted by Cinemax or Netflix or, who knows, at this rate, maybe a car insurance company) that's asking potential directors to submit three videos: One drama, one action, and one comedy.

For the action clip, Bella went to La Push and shot the guys cliff jumping and riding their bikes. She wrote a three minute script about growing up on a reservation and drowning your sorrows in thrills and cheap alcohol. The closing shot is Sam Uley sitting on his father's porch, drinking a beer and asking Bella if she thought Native Americans would ever get to be in a Hollywood movie as something other than an under-aged mythical creature.

The not so subtle dig at the movie series that had put Edward Cullen on the map was no accident. He was face for the contest.

For the dramatic clip, Bella went even further, reshooting a scene from the first film in that series that starred Cullen.

"I know what you are," Jessica whispered.

"Say it," Mike leered. "Out loud."

Yeah, Edward Cullen was going to love that one.

In a surprising moment of lucidity, Jessica had asked Bella how she thought criticizing Edward Cullen's past cinematic work was going to win a contest he was running. Her language was a trifle stronger: "What the fuck, Bella? I want to be a star one day, and making Edward Cullen look like a dweeb isn't going to help that."

Bella shrugged. All that she had promised Jessica was a chance to get her cleavage on tv.

Bella's final feature, the comedy, was a clip about filming a film about zombies.

 _"Cut," Sam cried._

 _"Daddy never runs his movies like this," Jessica announced, pushing the zombie off of her._

" _You know what your problem is, don't you?" Mike asked Sam, holding the camera._

 _Sam ignored him, studying the script._

 _Jake patted Sam on the back. "Save you some effort. I already counted. I've only got 200 lines."_

 _"How many times does someone say 'Ugghh'?" Sam asked._

 _"'Ugghh' isn't a word," Tyler told him. "You don't have to pay actors for saying things that aren't words."_

" _We're getting paid?" Eric asked._

 _Mike chimed in again. "Are or aren't your zombies sentient?"_

 _Jessica snorted. "You're the camera guy. Who cares what you think?"_

" _What does it matter if they're sentient if they're going to eat brains?" Tyler demanded. "Would you really care if the guy behind the counter at the coffee shop could count to ten if he was about to eat your face?"_

 _Mike clarified. "It's all in the delivery. The eyes. You got yourself a smart zombie, I'll zoom in on the face. You'll see the eyes working. You got yourself a stupid zombie and I'll zoom in on something else."_

 _"In what universe is 'Ugghh' a meaningful contribution to a conversation?" Sam was still stuck on that._

 _"What do you want a zombie to say?" Tyler asked, fiddling with a bottle of pills._

 _"Why does he have to say anything at all?"_

 _Zombie #7, who was cleaning fake blood out of his ears, chose to take umbrage at this. "I am a classically trained actor. I played Othello." At least that's what he meant to say. Unfortunately, a prosthetic was attached to his jaw to make it look as if his mouth had been torn open, and his words came out a bit muddled._

 _Mike continued. "And how fast is he supposed to be going? I've got all sorts of trick shots up my sleeve. If they're slow, I've got shadows to increase the suspense, whereas if they're fast, it's a whole other story entirely."_

 _"Daddy has people who figure this sort of thing out for him. He goes to the set and things happen. It seems to me that things ought to work like that," Jessica huffed._

 _"Can't we film the zombies and add audio later?" Sam asked._

 _"What's wrong with the dialogue the way I wrote it?" Tyler demanded, before downing three pills at one go._

 _"I just said that I've only got 200 lines," Jake said. "Isn't anyone listening?"_

 _"And we haven't been very clear on the source of this particular zombie menace. Is Hell full, so that there's no place for any more dead people? Or is it a chemical spill, or a genetic experiment gone wrong, or good old voodoo? My hope's on the latter. There hasn't been a good voodoo movie in I don't know how long." Mike was clearly an aficionado._

 _Zombie #7 ripped the dislocated jaw off._

 _"We don't have enough money to film the zombies now and add audio later," someone off-set said._

 _And, shaking a couple of pills out of another bottle, Tyler tried to explain. "The zombie isn't just dead. He's dead flesh. And what's dead flesh but raw material waiting to be regurgitated as the end product? I know what you're asking: Is it feminist or post-feminist or something more? I get that. It's not supposed to be easy. I mean, are zombies a symbol of our neutered, de-racialized flesh, turned to profit in the capitalist machine? Buried under so much makeup that you can't tell the difference between a man and a woman, an Asian and a Caucasian? Lifeless fields ripe for the implantation of the corporate seed. But how can you encourage production without gender? Sex is the source of the creativity, the gestating egg that produces the end product. Capitalists—the Owners—they're the ones who haven't got any sex. But the workers are the seed and the fruit—they're the raw material, the manufacturers, and the end product."_

 _"I played Othello," Zombie #7 yelled._

 _Jake took a practice swing with a disembodied zombie arm._

Bella won the contest. As a result, she was appointed as Edward Cullen's assistant as he took on the task of directing for the first time. Four months to the day of her arrival in Hollywood, she tried to kill herself.

It's the sick swell of anguish—the sudden dip made all the more pathetic by the height of the fall—that makes me remember. I'm pulled from the tatters of my daydream as I realize that I've forgotten all about my Tulpa.

I look around my bedroom. Just because I've forgotten about him doesn't mean that he's forgotten about me.

But I don't see him anywhere.

I still have two hours before I have to go to work, so I try to make myself study. The next book on my Comps reading list is devoted to Gnosticism.

Dan Brown makes Gnosticism sound like it's just fodder for a conspiracy theory about Jesus being married and having babies, but that's the least interesting part of it, and not even all that indicative of Gnosticism in general. I say "in general" because the so-called Gnostics had very little in common with each other, besides being lumped together by outsiders who just didn't understand (which is kind of ironic, because the word "gnosis" means "wisdom"). So when people talk about Gnosticism, they're really talking about their personal favorite brand of Gnosticism. And my personal favorite brand of Gnosticism is all about Tulpas.

Gnostics didn't use the word "Tulpa," of course, which I'd never heard of until yesterday. But according to Gnosticism, the world's all Maya. That is, it doesn't exist. Not really.

Which makes perfect sense to me.

I suppose that it's kind of counterintuitive for someone who is filling up a notebook entitled _Memoirs to Prove the Non-Existence of the World_ to try and create a Tulpa. Gnosticism is supposed to be about escaping the illusion that is this world, not adding to it.

I get Gnosticism. I do. There's something very romantic about thinking that you're in on this big secret (the "gnosis") and that everyone else (everyone who treats you like shit) is going to hell. It must be kind of vindicating to think that you're one of the select, and that you'll eventually get your revenge, even if it takes a long time. Gnostics took it up a notch, of course, by saying that the very world in which they suffered persecution didn't exist. I admire that kind of commitment to self-deception.

You'd think that with something this fucked up that scholarship on Gnosticism would be more interesting. But it's all very cut-and-dry. The book that I'm reading is trying to figure out how this cache of gnostic scrolls found its way into a hole at Nag Hammadi, in the Egyptian desert, in the fourth century CE. The author is going on and on about patronage networks and socioeconomic pressures.

In other words, the book's blaming everything on money and politics.

These days, it's become unfashionable to talk about conversion in connection with belief. Historians think that people converted in antiquity because they had to—because there was a knife to their throat, or to get a job and feed their families—not because they _believed._ Historians don't even really think that people converted, if by that we mean a complete and total reorientation of the soul. Christians were just pagans in Christian disguise, for instance.

So I can't, to give a hypothetical, write an article saying that a person wanted to be Gnostic because they thought that Gnosticism is true. I'd look crazy. Not only because that's totally subjective—no different than a Christian saying that Christians converted because Christianity is true (though that's what Christians said)—but because saying that someone could legitimately believe that the world doesn't exist is kind of crazy.

Nowadays, you can maybe say that you believe the world's just Maya and Samsara, because Hinduism and Buddhism are accepted religions. You'll look like a hippy but people won't lock you up. But who the hell's ever heard of Gnosticism?

No one. At least, not until that damn Dan Brown book, and he screwed it up.

As I give a damn if Jesus was married, except insofar as it would be a good _screw you_ to my so-called Catholic father, which probably isn't at all fair to Catholics—or to Christians—as a whole.

My mother claims that my father once hired a guy to forge death certificates for her and me as part of a ruse so that my father could get back into this seminary that he allegedly left in order to marry my mother.

The story probably isn't true. My mother lies all of the time (it took me a long time to realize this, because she lies about lying).

I suppose that I could ask my father about what she said, but I'd have no way of knowing whether he was telling me the truth. And, anyway, I don't think I want to hear what he has to say.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I'm feeling guilty for wasting so much time at work yesterday, so today I read my emails, for real this time. There's nothing much for me to follow up on, and what I do have to follow up on is utterly, mind-numbingly tedious, but it pisses me off because my coworkers should have taken care of it while I was on vacation, otherwise what's the point of vacation?

I check my school email too, only to confirm that my advisor is still blowing me off about my sample Comps questions. I know that I will probably have to see him in person to get anything out of him, I don't think that I can take going to his office again only for him to spend the entire time talking about a sailboat that he promises to take me on but never will.

This sailboat is not a euphemism. My advisor has actually taken some of my fellow students on that damn sailboat. Not me though.

I have also heard that other students actually get reading recommendations from their advisors for their Comps, and suggestions regarding potential questions. Imagine that. An advisor who _advises_.

I'm not even sure that I want to study antiquity. I'm only in this program because of _them._ The two of them. It's always coming back to _them_.

"So let me get this straight, you're taking classes next semester?" J asked.

"Yes." I confirmed that I was indeed enrolled.

"And they're not directed towards any particular degree program?"

"Taking courses towards any particular degree program would be far too practical for me," I joked.

"And when are you going to do something about that?" V piped in. They were always double-teaming me.

"Next year," and here I felt the need for further explanation, "well just because what I had planned on doing, I realized, I would hate, which I knew all along, but thought was necessary, but then, just looking to look, I did look, something I'd never been able to bring myself to do before"—because I'd have a panic attack whenever I tried—"and saw that what I planned to do would be totally unnecessary, but in planning to do that, I really hadn't left enough time to apply for the programs I wanted, in Europe, and why do something unless it's something I want, so I didn't."

Back then, I wanted to be an archaeologist and my archaeology professor in undergrad had mentioned that it was important for archaeologists to be well-rounded, to master photography, sketching, chemistry, osteology, and geology. So I was going to take classes at the university—because I got tuition remission from my job—at least until I could get into a program in England. Because I wanted to go to school in England. Because apparently I was a child who wanted to live a medieval fantasy. In other words, all of that was just a pipe-dream.

Besides, I could never afford to support my family and go to school in Europe. Meaning that classes at the university that I planned to take in photography, sketching, chemistry, osteology, and geology would not only be atrocious to sit through (when you don't believe in the world, art is just simulations of simulations, and science is—don't get me started), they would be a waste of time.

J and V both gave me a look—one of those looks—so I tried again. "I mean this really has been a hard year for me, in some respects the worst of my life. But now I think I've found myself" (though "finding myself," in retrospect, was probably just the peace of stasis) "like I've found myself in the past, only now I've really learned and I've grown."

"That sounds like a cop out," J said, looking at V and raising one of his devil eyebrows—perfect fucking inverted 'V's.

"It does," I admitted, "but it's true." Then, because they always made me feel so inadequate, like nothing I said was enough, so I just kept talking, agreeing even, to things that weren't true—like when V said I had such a short temper, which was true, but then she said that I probably threw things, which wasn't true, but I agreed anyhow, even though I'd never been physically violent in my life—so I kept babbling. I said, "I could tell you the story of my life, and you'd be sobbing." _Dear God!_ Why had I said that?

I _didn't_ say, though I ought to have said: To forgive a person for what she doesn't forgive herself, you'd have to crawl inside of her skin, and she would have to let you. I would have to let them inside of me.

I kept talking. "But next year, next year."

V snorted. "Well, I just think that if a person won't even go through with the trouble of applying, because that isn't really that much trouble when you think about it" ( _asshole_ ) "if you're not even serious enough to do that, than you're not going to be serious about finishing the program."

 _Motherfucker_.

I now have proof (and not just my firm belief) that that was an incredibly ignorant thing for V to say. My seriousness about academia has never been the problem, only the horror of having to leave school for lack of sufficient funds, or the knowledge that to dream of success in my own life is to want too much and that I MUST be kicked back to the earth, for such is endemic to those of my blood. Not to mention that neither of my parents was working and my brother was ever-closer to utter ruin (whatever that meant, the concept being but an inarticulated nightmare in my head). Besides, there remained the strangely captivating nature of impending disaster—its many shades—for however close "the end" might seem (another bill not paid, Child Protective Services taking my brother, my parents killing each other, et cetera, et cetera), it was always just out of reach, waiting for me, so that I was ever redefining what failure meant, lowering the bar (it being okay that my brother calls me because the police are at our parents' place _again_ , so long as it never happens _again_ , until the next time, but then it's okay that time too as long as it never happens _again_ , until the next time), and hence stemming the tide perhaps only in the sense that I had not yet lost everything, but no doubt that only meant that I was becoming accustomed to my position, so that the miserable was made livable, and no longer seemed so awful. V didn't know what she was talking about.

"Just food for thought," she said before turning on her heel to walk away with J.

So I'm studying antiquity because it's the only program that I can imagine tolerating at the university that just happens to enjoy tuition remission with my place of employment.

I think that I might hate it—studying antiquity—but the alternative, not going to school at all, would mean just settling, and I think that I would slit my wrists if I had to do that.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I sit at my desk, doing work that a trained monkey can do (and yet work that none of my coworkers had apparently been capable of doing in my absence), wondering if my advisor is doing me a favor by not inviting me onto his damn sailboat (not that I want to go; I'm only feigning enthusiasm so as to seem amiable), and also wondering what my Tulpa is doing or if he _is_ doing anything (if he doesn't exist yet, he couldn't very well be doing anything, could he?). Then it strikes me that the questions that I'm asking about my Tulpa sound rather like debates from the early Christian Christological controversy and I never have been able to remember the difference between Sabellianism and Arianism and all of the other -isms, so I decide not to think about the metaphysical implications of my Tulpa's activities, even though _that_ is the very point— _thought_. My Tulpa is a thought creature. He is made of thoughts. Or he will be, when I finish thinking him up.

 _So I'll just have to keep thinking about him, won't I?_

An email goes around the office asking if anyone is interested in happy hour, but I can't bear the thought of another grisly attempt at what is so glibly termed "kinship" in anthropological circles.

Besides, I am too busy studying for Comps, so I have an excuse for bowing out of drinks after work.

Because despite what V and J said, I _am_ serious about my program. I'm in school and I'm studying for my comprehensive exams and if that doesn't prove that I am serious, then I don't know what possibly could.

I remember that another grad student said that people always have nervous breakdowns before comps. That it's a fact.

Am I having a nervous breakdown?

Well regardless, I don't think that it's right to make a person feel like crap for struggling with the decision to apply to graduate school or for their life-choices in general.

Then before I know it, I'm back there again, wracking my brain, trying to figure out what I could have said, what I could have done differently. As if there is a version of this that could have come out differently, the three of us still friends.

But I just picture the two of them sitting there, watching me like a bug under a microscope. They were both psych majors, which I see now explains it, but at the time, what did I know?

Was it normal to have your coworkers insist on having lunch with you every day? Every single fucking day.

That shit's not normal. I know that now. I've observed my other coworkers. I've looked it up online.

And as for their constant questioning. I thought that was maybe what friends did. Not the friends that I'd had growing up of course, but maybe that was because I'd never been really close to anyone before. Certainly not close enough to stay in touch after graduation. Maybe real friends were supposed to want to know this much about each other.

Not that I ever asked V and J as many questions as they asked me.

I knew it was strange, but I told myself that it was just because I wasn't used to having real friends. Working so hard in college to keep up my grades for that scholarship and working full-time to support my family, and nevertheless graduating with a combined BA/MA. It wasn't fucking easy. I didn't have time for friends. And the few times I tried—going out with old friends from high school like K and D—it was a disaster. At school, I struggled just to get along with classmates. I worked the night shift so that I wouldn't have to deal with customers. I didn't date. I'd already lost my virginity in high school, so as far as I was concerned, I'd already ticked off all of the boxes on the scorecard of normalcy. Besides, I had my hands full dealing with my family.

Naturally, I felt this vast void where my social life should have been whenever V and J would talk about their friends. I know that they didn't understand about my family.

But my Tulpa's different. I imagine explaining it to him. _Picture yourself_ , I imagine myself saying, _you're fresh out of college. You've graduated—something no one in your family's ever come close to doing—and you have your first real job. You're a grown-up. You wear grown-up clothes. You do grown-up work. Nonetheless, you aren't very good with people. Never have been. But here are these two people who for some reason want to be your friend. It strikes you as a little peculiar—a little suffocating—that they want to spend so much time together, inside and outside of work. That they get annoyed when you say that you have to spend time with your family. You still live at home, taking care of said family, and you know that grown-ups aren't supposed to do that, so you know that your excuses make you sound childish. You avoid the engagements outside of work as much as possible, but at work, you still have to see them every day, usually several times a day. At first it's exciting, because you've never had someone show this much interest in you before. After a while, though, it becomes to seem like a chore, a pressure on your chest when the time for lunch nears. You know it's just you, however, that you're being churlish, because every time you see them, almost every time, you feel lighter after a while, so happy. You do enjoy your time with them, usually. But still. Does it have to be all of the time? You start to feel almost as if they're watching you, always. And every day at lunch they will want a recap of your activities since last you met, so that you're always keeping a running tab of exciting things—of ways to make the things you're doing seem exciting—so that they'll laugh, even when you're cleaning up your parents' vomit and you have no intention of telling anyone about that. Eventually, the strain of it begins to mount and you start to wonder if you could make up an excuse to skip lunch—say that you have to study—because you know if you just say that you think it's a little odd that the three of you always have to have lunch together, if you say that you just want some time to yourself, you'll have to listen to V's high-pitched dismay, because why, just why, and J won't say anything, but V will be so upset, just like every other time you try to back out, only to give in, every time, V's damn voice reminding you of your mother, both women putting that sick feeling in your stomach, so that after a while, you don't even bother trying._

If my Tulpa is listening to my thoughts, he doesn't respond so as I can tell.

I'm sure my coworkers have no idea that this is how I saw V and J. The three of us used to go everywhere together. We ate every lunch together. We went on vacation together.

And then we didn't.

If I go to this happy hour tonight, I know that my coworkers will be expecting me to tell them what happened with V and J. Because they know something happened. It would be impossible for them not to know.

I thought that I was being honorable, not telling anyone what happened, not breathing a word.

The day that I moved my desk, turning it around (when V was at J's for lunch), I made so much noise that my supervisor came running in and helped me even though I didn't want her to and was embarrassed and one of the legs had fallen off of the desk and a bunch of papers were sliding to the floor. But when we were done, I was so goddamned grateful, because with my desk turned around like that, I didn't have to sit there with V in the corner of my vision all of the time, and I didn't have to see J at the door whenever he came to see her. Turning my desk meant that they had a clear view of my back, unfortunately, and the knives that they'd left there, but at least I didn't have to look at them.

I still had to listen to V's non-stop bullshit sighs, of course, and the clicking of her tongue and her music (playing the same fucking CD too loudly over her headphones, a CD that _I fucking gave her_ ).

Which was why I was so very grateful when my supervisor finally asked if I wanted to move to another office. She said that she was offering only because she couldn't help but notice that I was unhappy. I certainly hadn't said anything. I never _asked_ to move.

I had kept my mouth shut. Just like when we were all friends.

If I _had_ spoken up when were still friends, if I'd said _no_ to V and J just once and _stuck_ to it—

Sometimes, I worry that V and J might have given some of our coworkers a story about what happened. But what could V and J really say? _She's crazy. She ruined our vacation._ All true. But not really the meat of the matter, I think.

If they said anything, no one's mentioned it to me. And my coworkers are certainly still interested in knowing the truth, even after all this time. They ask me straight out sometimes, _So what ever happened with you guys?_ I just shrug.

For any of my coworkers to side with me—

 _Side with me?_ It's such an insidiously divisive phrase that I hate myself even for thinking it—

For them to side with me, I'd have to tell them the truth.

And they _would_ , they'd side with me alright. What V and J did is unforgiveable.

But I can't. Because part of me fears that my coworkers wouldn't side with me after all.

I was working at this company long before V ever got here, and J worked in another department entirely, but all of my friends were their friends first. V and J were always so much more sociable than me.

I'm the only one left. V and J have already moved on, J to graduate school and V to hell-knew-where.

 _To hell_ , actually. She probably went to hell.

Good riddance.

But I'm still at the company. Still surrounded by reminders.

I know that there has to be something really wrong with me—this endemic vulnerability—to still be so upset over losing them. They were only friends, after all. Just acquaintances. All of their innuendo aside, we never even came close to having sex.

I thought that it would get better when I didn't have to see them at work every day, but it hasn't. There's still a hole in my chest.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I go to the happy hour, thinking that it will help me get over my addiction to dereality, or maybe focus my addiction to dereality into one solitary outlet, like a Tulpa. It's a disaster. All rough edges and blaring noises. The waitress seems mad at me for some reason, but she's laughing at everyone else. I ask if they have cider and she rolls her eyes. "Like _apple_ cider?" she clarifies.

Isn't it made from apples? "Uh, I think so."

She glances at the others at the table, my coworkers, and grins a secret smile. What don't I get? "It's in a _bottle_ ," she tells me. "Not on _tap._ " Everyone else had gotten stuff on tap but I don't care. So I tell her that.

"Whatever," she shrugs and walks away.

I tell myself it doesn't matter because what do I care anyhow, and I try to start a conversation, telling an embarrassing story because self-deprecation is the only way I know how to break the ice, just laying myself out there already bleeding so a person doesn't think there's any sport in taking me down. It has a social function what I do, my awkwardness paving the way for everyone else so that they don't have to worry about doing something stupid, because I've already done it. But some people—V—don't get that that's what I'm doing, that it's a social service. They just smell blood in the water and go for more.

So I mention my teen supernatural romance pay-per-view viewing preferences, and it's meant to be a joke, even if it's true, and M says "I'd have more respect for you if you watched Jenna Jameson and zombie strippers."

I don't care what he thinks either.

But N is drunk. He asks, with utter disregard for the gravity of his question, if I've anything approaching a lover. His language is much cruder.

I know that they all think something more than friendship was going on with V and J.

I try to figure out how to answer N in a way that will seem funny, not rude. Defensive, but not mean. A way that will discourage more questions, without alienating anyone. But N's question is just like one of J's old set-ups.

J once asked me to define love. In light of what happened later, I think that he only asked because he was thinking of breaking up with his girlfriend.

I knew just what to say of course. Love is devotion to Beauty, the One, in ever-increasing degrees of perfection. Plato's _Symposium_. But for some reason, the fact that I cite books as evidence makes people think that I don't know what I'm talking about. If it was the Bible I was quoting, no one would have a thing to say, so maybe I should have cited _The Song of Songs_ , which is about as lusty as a person can get for God, but what do I know?

J told me that I was an idiot.

And apparently, I say something equally idiotic to N, who dismisses my response as incomprehensible and launches into a debate about Jenna Jameson with M.

Watching them, their easy camaraderie, it strikes me that alliances _should_ be simple, free of guile. Yet my friendship with V and J was rife with jealousy.

 _It's much better to efface one's self_ , I decide, slowly suffocating in silence, jammed into a booth with five people I see almost every day, but who haven't a word to say to me it seems.

"Wasting away on the wretched wealth of your self-imposed misery," I imagine my Tulpa saying to me. He's just a voice in my head, with no form, but that's just as well since there isn't enough room in the booth for him.

"Is it really all that bad?" I wonder.

"Of course. Shouldn't the way, if it is truly _the way_ —be easy? Wouldn't you think?" I imagine my Tulpa drinking a gin and tonic, the latter his own blend, naturally. I can picture the glass, right next to mine, and his fingers curled around it, but the rest of him remains in shadow. A murky, shadowy mystery.

I think about what he's said—about whether or not _the way_ should be easy. Don't monks, after all, have to struggle in their endeavors?

A balled up napkin hits my cheek. I blink.

"I _said_ 'What do you think's up with IT lately?'" B says again, looking at me.

I know that I'm supposed to start bitching about that piece of shit new software they're trying to pass off on us, and I manage to respond accordingly, if not eloquently.

I stay at the bar another hour, trying to participate and having only marginal success. They make fun of me because I'm only sipping at my cider and because it's just a cider. But I only drink at these things because not drinking just invites questions and no one's ever satisfied with your answers. I remember how much it pissed of J's girlfriend that I didn't drink, like it was a personal affront to her, the fact that my parents were alcoholics not impressing her one bit. "What's that got to do with you?" she wanted to know. It has a lot to do with me of course because alcoholism sometimes has a genetic component and even if it didn't, I never wanted to see myself like them. But it was like me not drinking was the equivalent of accusing J's girlfriend of being an alcoholic, as if I gave a shit about whether or not she drank too much. In the end, I decided that it was just easier to drink—or to pretend to drink—even if I still wasn't drinking enough to pass muster.

I leave before I've finished the cider, joking that I'm a cheap date because I'm already tipsy, which is true, but they're rolling their eyes.

 _My Tulpa wouldn't care if I didn't drink_ , I tell myself, stumbling towards the Metro, _because he's classy like that_.

But then it occurs to me that maybe I shouldn't go around thinking things like that. That maybe I've been thinking too much altogether.

Because the back of my neck tingles.

On the train, I can't help myself from doing it again, though. I imagine that I'm not alone, even though I'm the only one in the car. I imagine that someone—my Tulpa?—is watching me, maybe from the next car over.

No one's ever interested in me. I never catch anyone's eye.

Unless it's to sneer at me. Or to snap at me for being in the way.

I wonder what it would be like to be of real interest to someone. To be watched. To be followed.

So I pretend that someone has indeed got his eye on me.

I know it should be frightening to realize that I'm being watched. But it's also kind of flattering. To matter that much to someone.

Fucked up as it sounds, it's almost romantic.

Which just says everything anyone could possibly need to know about where I am in my life.

But if someone's going to go out of his way to watch me, I don't see why he couldn't be in love with me. Perhaps he's trying to work up his nerve to approach me. He's been in love with me for days. Months. Years. And I never even noticed him.

On the other hand, if someone's that shy, there's probably something wrong with him.

And if he's really following me around like this, chances are he's a creeper. For all I know, he could be a killer.

He could stalk women and then kill them. He probably keeps momentos of their hair in a cigar box. I dye my hair, but maybe he hasn't been following me long enough to know that. Maybe he thinks this is my natural color and that I fit his type.

Hair color alone couldn't possibly make me so desirable. The guy following me no doubt specializes in women who are forgettable. He's banking on the fact that no one will care that I'm gone. That no one will report me missing.

The detectives who will eventually be called in to investigate my case will decide that I probably ran away and killed myself. They'll decide that I'm not even interesting enough for someone to want to stalk and kill me.

Ten years from now, maybe I'll show up on one of those cold case shows. They'll have realized by then that I fit a pattern. Or maybe they'll have found my bones, with knife marks (and teeth marks?) on the ribs so that no one can deny it was murder.

There'll be a nationwide manhunt but they won't catch my killer. Or if they do, I'll just be victim #6. Hardly worth remembering.

And that's as far as I get by the time that the train reaches my stop.

I hurry to disembark, and even though I know I shouldn't, I take the shortcut through the garage that leads to the alley. I take it _because_ I shouldn't—I know that it isn't safe—I take it _because_ I'm afraid.

Now logic's inspiring two contradictory impulses—logically I know that it isn't safe but logically I know that the danger's all in my head. Why would anyone want to kill me?

' _You can't keep letting your imagination run away like this_ ,' I warn myself, refusing to let myself rush through the empty garage.

But the back of my neck is tingling again.

A breath. No, a breeze.

A sensation, oddly displaced along the flesh.

I cock my head to the side, listening.

It's a feeling—no, that's too strong a word. It's the hint of a sensation, unformed and undecided, just a haze in the periphery of my consciousness. Unsure of itself.

A sibilant whisper and a shiver. Like falling asleep. It's not unpleasant.

They say that some people have premonitions. There's a preternatural instinct warning them that something is amiss. Perhaps it's nothing more than a particularly astute power of observation. The ability to notice when a stray article is slightly out of place. A light that's off when it should be on. None of it registers on a conscious level. But it's there nonetheless.

Tiny cues. Like the way a person will glance away when he lies—you won't know the source of your suspicion, but still it's there, because subconsciously you've noticed that glance.

I've never been cognizant of experiencing anything like that.

Until now.

 _Finally_ , I think, _something is going to happen to me._

My Tulpa?

No. A dead body.

 **AN:**

 **Thank you for reading.**

 **About this chapter of** _ **Book of Monsters:**_

 **Current scholarly thinking on conversion in antiquity – A D Nock's book on conversion in antiquity is the seminal work on the notion that conversion in antiquity was a faith-based, complete and total reorientation of the soul (for ex., the fourth century CE Augustine of Hippo's conversion as described in the** _ **Confessions**_ **, which can be found very easily online). Holum's article "In the Blinking of the Eye" is a seminal work on the notion that Augustine was the exception to the rule; Holum argues that conversion was driven by political and socioeconomic needs. Right now, Holum's side is winning the argument in scholarly circles.**

 **Christological controversy – The argument over Jesus' relationship to God (is he the son of God or is he God? is he human or half-human or only human some of the time? was Mary his real mother or only the mother of his human part? et cetera).**

 **Sabellianism and Arianism – Two early Christian so-called heresies ("so-called" because of course** _ **they**_ **wouldn't have called themselves heretics) that disagreed over Jesus' relationship to God.**

 **The** _ **Song of Songs**_ **is mentioned in Lady Gwynedd's** _ **Bear Valley Ranch**_

 **Rec: Lady Gwynedd's** _ **Bear Valley Ranch**_


	3. Chapter 3

**Spoiler Alert: I discuss the films** _ **Sunset Boulevard, The Maltese Falcon**_ **(Humphrey Bogart version), and Otto Preminger's** _ **Laura**_ **, but I don't give away key details.**

 **Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephanie Meyer. Aside from a few obvious parallels to the** _ **Twilight**_ **universe, including some fanfictions that will be mentioned when pertinent, this plot belongs to me.**

I'm darting through the garage even though it's all lit up, eyeing the shadows and trying to not to look as if I'm already spooked. There's a little alley behind the parking lot that will get me the rest of the way home, and as bad as that alley smells, as dark as that alley is, I'm hurrying to reach it, because I've just glimpsed a face in the reflection of an SUV and I'm sure that it must be my imagination because I'm sure that there's no one in this garage with me.

By the time that I hit the alley, I'm almost running, even though I'm sure that the reflection I've seen is just a trick of the light.

I'm going so fast that I can't even see where I'm going, especially in the dim light of the alley, and I trip. So that's how I'm on my hands and knees, kneeling in the scraps of garbage that have fallen out of the dumpster. And it's when I go to get up that I brush my fingers over some extra fingers that're just lying there waiting for me to find, along with the body that goes with them.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

My knowledge of dead bodies is limited to what I've gathered from noir. Yes, I like noir _and_ fanfiction. (I have got layers after all.) College is supposedly the time for experimentation. Other people might have tried pot and bisexuality. I fell in love with Alan Ladd and Dashiell Hammett.

The first scene of _Sunset Boulevard_ is William Holden's corpse floating in a pool, and I remember thinking, _This is going to be a great movie_.

Because when the hero's already dead in the very first scene, then you know you haven't got anything to look forward to.

Noir tells the truth. Which is just ironic, because it's about people who lie. They lie all of the time. They steal and murder and betray one another like it's the only thing they know how to do. And it's such a fucking comfort, because at least they're telling the truth: The world is shit. And everyone in it is shit. And anyone who tells you different is lying.

 _Twilight_ fanfiction's the complete opposite of all that of course. In _Twilight_ fanfiction, everything works out in the end because I only read HEAs. But HEAs aren't very honest, are they? Shy Bellas, victim Bellas, are all the rage, but these shy, victim Bellas are contradictions in terms. The only reasonable explanation for extreme shyness is severe trauma—hence the victim part—but a proper Bella isn't supposed to let that make her angry or defensive. Everyone's falling over backwards to be her best friend and her lover, asking over and over how anyone could have ever wanted to hurt her, because she's just a ray of pure light, somehow having maintained her vulnerability and sweetness against all of the odds. Which is just about the most improbable thing I've ever heard. A simpering flower starving for affection simply wouldn't make it. But no one—not even me—wants to read about the kind of person who is realistically capable of surviving that kind of trauma. No one wants to hear about her.

No one wanted to hear about it when I was growing up, that's for sure. Because apparently, for some reason, jokes about suicide are considered déclassé. Casual references to your alcoholic parents' binge drinking are downright vulgar. Instead, you're supposed to pretend like it's all fine. That "it's all fine" that you're on the verge of eviction because your parents can't pay the rent on a fucking trailer. That "it's all fine" that you only have two friends and they're embarrassed to be seen with you and your thrift store chic with the holes. That "it's all fine" that your biology teacher wants to know why you haven't signed up for the AP test and you have to tell her—in front of the entire class—that you can't afford the measly fifty dollar fee. But "it's all fine."

There's this one scene in the Humphrey Bogart _Maltese Falcon_ , when he's at this book store. He tells the shop girl to take off her glasses and then they have a drink.

I didn't get it at first. Because of course I was like, _I can be a shop girl. I wear glasses and I like books_. But I didn't understand why he would like her better without the glasses.

I get it now. The real bookshop girl doesn't exist in noir. There's no room for fantasies like that. There're no quiet, shy girls who like to read and daydream. There are plenty of show girls and girls who dream of being show girls, but they're all braver and crasser than I'll ever have the guts to be.

I certainly don't fool myself into thinking that I'm the femme fatale or even the level-headed, girl Friday. But at least I'm in the movie. I might not have a line, but I'm on the set. I'm the one in the corner, working behind the counter at the deli, wearing glasses, and pouring a soda for a little boy.

Everyone's going to hell in the movies I'm in—or maybe they live there already. So I haven't got great expectations. But at least I'm in the fucking movie.

Because I'm not in _Twilight_. Or whatever latest Nicholas Sparks movie's made it to the big screen. I'm not cute enough or cancer-ridden enough for John Green. I haven't got the quirky sense of style or the breasts that would be needed to pick up the spirits of a quadrapalegic bent on self-destruction. I haven't got anything that would make anyone give me a second glance.

Which is why I was so grateful for V and J's attention that I let them walk all over me.

All of the movies I'm in have scenes in trailer parks, with drunks and mean, angry fighters who have spittle running down their chins. There are escapes out of windows (the glass replaced with a cheap piece of plexi-glass like my bedroom when I was kid) and forlorn hopes that the neighbors won't call the cops this time.

All of the movies I'm in end badly. I know that.

So I don't have high expectations for the way it's going to turn out when I call the police to report that I've found a body. My knowledge of crime—not counting domestic disputes—is based almost entirely on noir. In noir, the cops are always corrupt and/or incompetent. My experience of cops in real life—in connection to domestic disputes—confirms this. Because what good did they ever do me? Looking at me like I was trash, just for living in a trailer park.

I don't like cops. That should go without saying. Even without the bias of personal experience, I've got the stuff I've been seeing on the news. And a fondness for noir's not likely to improve my opinion, despite the persistence of a fantasy of coming home and finding a detective in my apartment. Like Dana Andrews was found sitting in the apartment in Otto Preminger's _Laura_ —but even Dana Andrews is a cops' cop. A tool. The masculinity of his features belying the femininity of his name as he snarls at Clifton Webb.

Though the look on his face when he wakes up in Laura's apartment—

The woman at the 911 center stays on the line with me until the first policeman shows up. And despite my misgivings, he's nice enough.

Much nicer than the detective.

"You seem nervous," the detective says when he comes.

I _am_ nervous. I'm nervous and still feeling a bit tipsy despite how little I drank, and, yeah, wary because cops can go around calling themselves "peace officers," but that don't make it true— _doesn't_ make it true.

" _Are_ you nervous?" the detective asks when I don't say anything.

"I just found a dead body," I remind him carefully, because it seems obvious to me why I should be anxious but I don't want to rattle anyone's cage.

"You seem nervous of _me_ ," he enunciates carefully.

"Oh." I _have_ been angling my body away from him, so I force myself to face him head-on and even meet his eyes. I don't like what I see there. Suspicion or maybe just the hardness of being a cop and having to hate everyone all day long because he doesn't make enough money to be risking his life on the job, and maybe everyone _is_ a terrorist. Perhaps if this guy was a plumber and not a storm-trooper, it would be different, but that movie _Clerks_ was wrong: Let's say that there _was_ a plumber on the Death Star when it blew up, and this plumber was just a dumb-fuck contractor, that doesn't mean we have to feel sorry for him being blown up. This plumber was morally culpable for deciding to fix a toilet for the Empire; even if he was just a contractor trying to feed his family. He had to face to repercussions of his decision to take the Empire's money, because you've got to be held responsible for your choices, reference your Jean-Paul Sartre. Otherwise Nietzsche was right and nothing means anything. So I don't care if this cop thinks he doesn't have a choice taking a night-stick to an unarmed protester. He does.

"What were you doing in the alley?" he asks.

"It's a shortcut. From the subway." I point at the sign, and notice that my hand is still grimy from my fall. I think about pulling out my hand-sanitizer again, despite the fact that I've already used about half the bottle since finding the body.

"Kind of dangerous, a woman going down an alley at night, don't you think?"

I shrug, not wanting to admit the truth. That I brushed the danger off because nothing ever happens to me. Because I'm the girl behind the counter. Not the star.

The fact that I've apparently been promoted to witness doesn't mean much. My scene will probably be cut.

"Did you see anyone?"

I remember the reflection I saw in a car window and start to say something, but break off. After all, I can't be sure that it wasn't a trick of the light.

And I certainly can't say that it might have just been my Tulpa, because that's crazy.

The detective's already noticed my hesitancy though. I can't back out of it.

I tell him that I thought I saw the reflection of someone's face while I was walking through the garage. "It was probably just pareidolia," I say.

"Para-what?

"You know," surely cops must know about this, "pareidolia. Seeing patterns when there really isn't anything there. People talk about it on those ghost hunting shows."

"You into ghosts?"

"Mostly demons."

"I'm sorry. What?"

"For school. I read books about demons sometimes." There are indeed a several books on my Comps reading list devoted to the subject of Late Antique demonology, and pareidolia definitely comes into it. Especially for guys like the desert fathers, the Christian monks living on the edge of the wasteland of Egypt. They weren't eating, not much, at least, and they weren't sleeping. But that doesn't mean that they were necessarily hallucinating. They were awfully isolated, living all on their own in the middle of nowhere. So they could be forgiven for thinking it unlikely that a flesh-and-blood person would just happen to passing by their cave. It made sense that they would assume they were seeing a demon, even if it was just pareidolia.

I don't say any of this to the detective, of course. As it is, I've already said too much.

"Are you drunk?" he wants to know. He only looks a couple of years older than me. But he looks tired. Sounds it too. Like he's gone through this conversation a thousand times before and he's about worn out, no life, no wife—no ring at least—and a suit that probably cost him more than he can really afford to pay.

"I have drunk but I am not drunk." I don't want him to think that I'm like everyone else.

"How much did you drink?"

It's too late. He's already made up his mind about me. And he's acting like I'm publicly intoxicated—and I wonder how intoxicated a person has to be to qualify for that—but my coworkers always make such a big deal if I don't drink anything. "Less than a glass."

"You seem like you've had more than a glass."

"I don't drink. I don't usually drink." I almost expect him to ask me _Why not,_ and that just makes me more anxious, because what business is it of his if I don't like to drink?

"You were on a date?"

"Happy hour."

He raises an eyebrow, and his next question is: "You work?"

I tell him where. I have to give him the names of the other people who were at the happy hour with me. I don't know their phone numbers but I tell him that we work together.

"Pretty grisly stuff," he says, pointing to the book in my hands.

I've still got Drake's _Violence in Late Antiquity: Perceptions and Practices_ clasped to my chest _._ I was pretending to read it during the subway ride."For school," I say.

He snorts.

I wonder if this is the normal way witnesses are interrogated. I wonder why I'm so weird. It occurs to me that I should try harder to be normal.

He tells me that I need to go into the station the next day so that they can do a sketch of the face I saw.

"Aren't there cameras?" I ask, because if there're cameras and there's nothing on the film, then I'm crazy, and that's all there is to it.

He looks annoyed at my question. "No. There aren't any cameras in that part of the garage."

Which makes it all the more asinine that I was taking a shortcut at this time of night. But he doesn't say that, instead handing me his card.

Then I'm coughing and spluttering and he's pounding me on the back, because I've glanced down at his name, and he didn't tell me his first name when he introduced himself, and I can't believe what I'm seeing.

Because apparently his name is Edward.

His last name isn't Cullen or Masen or anything like that, but the first name alone's bad enough, isn't it?

I manage to stop coughing and push his hand away, not even bothering to look at his face because I know that he's thinking I'm a freak.

Not that his opinion matters if he's just a figment of my imagination.

Besides, I'm too busy looking around at everyone else, wondering why they haven't noticed that I'm standing here talking to myself.

Fortunately, a Medical Examiner has apparently been waiting for a break in my interview with the detective. The two of them fall into conversation and I breathe a little more easily, knowing that other people can see the detective too, though maybe I'm just imagining them too.

Then I remember that the first cop—the nice one—shook the detective's hand, so maybe the detective really exists after all.

I've never known a person in real life with the name Edward (maybe in kindergarten?). It's too much to ask me to believe that it's a coincidence though. If anything, it's another entry for the _Memoirs to Prove the Non-Existence of the World_. Because this is how people start to believe in religion—synchronicity and all that.

But _Twilight_ is a book, not a religion. And I'm tired and I want to go home.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I don't sit up in bed concentrating on my Tulpa that night. In fact, I think I should stop with that altogether.

Instead, I put _Laura_ in the DVD player. If I'd been alive when _Laura_ came out, I would have been pissed. It doesn't stick to the book, and the book is great. But I was born nearly half-a-century after both came out and I saw the movie before I read the book. And there's a lot about the movie that could probably only be really appreciated several decades after it was made. Like the incongruity of Vincent Price playing a cowardly gigolo. And Mrs. Danver's from _Rebecca_ playing his sugar momma. It's like crackfic. Then Clifton Webb is playing a Clifton Webb character—so basically, Hugh Laurie and Michael Caine and Frank Langella all rolled up into one. At first, I couldn't stand Gene Tierney, but that might have been because I was actually jealous of her. Now, I've watched the movie so many times that I can't tell if Gene Tierney is crap-but-I-don't-mind-because-she's-Laura or actually a good-actress-performing-a-complex-role or a victim-of-the-few-bits-of-poor-dialogue-that-the-movie-happens-to-contain. Then there's Dana Andrews.

There's this one scene where Dana Andrews is reading all of Laura's letters. There's something very romantic about reading letters. To think that someone's got something that important to say.

I tried writing letters to V and J. I even used plain stationary and turned the pages sideways, folding the pages like a book, like in the old movies, but V and J would never write back to me.

I like to fantasize that I walk into my apartment and find Dana Andrews reading my letters. I don't know what the letters would say, but they'd be terribly important.

Round about the same time that I fell in love with Dana Andrews and Alan Ladd and Dashiell Hammett, I was reading a lot of Jean-Paul Sartre, so I can't help thinking of existentialism when I think of noir. They're essentially two expressions of the same basic idea: Everyone's fucked. In one sense, there's no morality. Or rather, there _is_ morality, but you have to make it up yourself.

I tried to explain that to J once. I said "Sartre says" and I told him all about there being no such thing as neutrality.

And since several decades had passed since Sartre had written, I had chaos theory on my side. _Everything affects everything else_. So you can't say you're neutral, because it's a choice and it has ramifications. (Everything collects karma. _Fucking everything_.)

J wasn't having it. "If I don't pick a side," he said "then you can't hold me responsible for what happens."

"Are you crazy?" I asked. I demanded to know how that was any different from what the Swiss did in World War II.

Then he said that the Swiss were within their rights.

 _The Swiss were within their rights._

So why was it that he thought people did bad things, I wanted to know.

 _Human nature,_ he said.

And why're people cruel?

 _Human_ fucking _nature._

Like it's just the way things are and there's no choice involved. No one to hold responsible—because you can't exactly haul Human Nature into world court.

That should have been a sign right there.

Because yeah, we live in a fucked up moral-less universe, but that doesn't mean that people aren't responsible for the shit they do. And I like noir because it's about trying to figure out how to make it in a fucked up universe, with consequences both fair and unfair, the implication being that even bad guys have it rough.

Of course, none of that means anything if the world doesn't actually exist, because the only way to really avoid getting karma is neutrality, just sitting back and watching the worst things imaginable happen. Because technically every act, good or bad, accrues karma. You'll go to hell (or be reborn) as punishment for your karma, even if you got it _helping_ people.

Which is why it's hard to reconcile being an existentialist with being a Gnostic. Neither philosophy's got much use for the world, but they differ in where you go from there. For existentialists, if the world doesn't matter, all that matters is what you do in it. Your actions are what give meaning to life, so you try to be good, or at least what you think is good. For Gnostics, however, the point is to get out of this world. They're like NeoPlatonists and Buddhists in that they want enlightenment or union with the Pleroma or Atman Brahman or whatever you want to call it (you can even make it sexual if you want to, progression towards the divine driven by "love," or lust, like in Plato's _Symposium_ or _The Song of Songs_ or Dante's _Divine Comedy_ ). But if this world doesn't exist, then our actions in this world are just chains holding us down, karma. And even good karma—the kind you get from helping people—is to be avoided if it means being shackled to a world that doesn't exist.

At least with no friends I've got less shackles.

Instead of watching _Laura_ , I find myself daydreaming.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

 _She doesn't consciously decide to kill herself. But she thinks to herself, if I die, I die._

 _Dreams are meant to be dreams. Not to be acted upon. Because when they come true, and you see them for the shit they really are, you'll have no choice but to kill yourself._

 _Everyone says you go to Hell-wood shiny and new but come away dirty and broken._

 _If you come away at all. Some end up like the Black Dahlia, with cigarette burns and cut in two, left in a field for an innocent kid to find._

 _No, not innocent. This is Hollywood. No one's innocent here._

 _This Bella's not innocent either. How could she be? Wanting to tell lies on the big screen. Because what else is directing movies if not lying?_

 _It's a racket, but Bella grew up with names like Harold Lloyd and Mary Pickford swimming 'round her head._

 _Now all that's swimming 'round her head is a shitty remake of_ His Girl Friday _because she's just realized that she got picked for this gig by mistake and no one thinks she's worth keeping around. At all._

 _And that's reality._

 _No, not just reality._

 _Reality_ television.

 _Bella won the contest to become Edward Cullen's directorial assistant, but that was only the beginning. Now camera guys follow Bella and Edward around as Bella and Edward (well really, just Edward) tell other camera guys what to shoot. Camera guys are even following Bella and Edward around when the two of them aren't actually working on the film, as they to and fro all about Hell-wood like minor demons in Dante's unfunny_ commedia.

 _Bella's a "reality star." There are whole websites devoted to the rat-nest she calls her hair. She gets letters from so-called fans offering to off her._

 _"You wanna be famous?" the jingle of the reality show she's on goes._

 _You wanna be famous?_ Just put your head back, close your eyes. This one will hurt.

 _A close-up of the star._ Mr. Cullen _, just like a shiny brillatined vampire, his lips blood red, human souls his fodder._

 _They say Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil at a crossroads to learn how to play the blues. There aren't many joints looking for someone to play that sort of music anymore but Bella must have found her way to a crossroads all the same, in a dream maybe, agreeing to the deal only because she thought it was just a dream, didn't know it was for keeps._

 _Because she isn't supposed to be here. She entered the contest, yeah, entered expecting to lose, entered like thousands of other hopefuls, hoping, at the most, they'd air a two second clip and say her name,_ her _name, like she was someone._

 _She didn't expect to win._

 _Just like she didn't expect to die._

 _She used to think fairy tales were what you saw on-screen, back when Claudette Colbert spoke so fine and a line from George Sanders fell down like a blade of sunlight, it cut right through every shadow in the house. Back when you could still see a whole scene set out like an art piece that someone had thought up in his dreams maybe, not just a series of endless takes spliced together with the actors taking turns being on a set that some guy'll draw on his computer later. Back in that twilight time when the metaphysics of the censor meant that sin had to look like virtue and virtue like sin, there being something desperate in the way that hopes made it to the screen because people could feel the end of the world coming and going, with the liquor that dulled the pain of the fall all backroom stuff from a joint down the road where a syncopated rhythm made them think_ This is it, this is it, this is all it, this is all it was ever meant to be _, the music all made up on the spot, then gone, never to be heard again._

 _And if that's what a person is dreaming about, then what the fuck does that say about reality?_

 _Reality is lechers and cinematographer sleazes with glossy cards giving jobs out to girls with rug burns on their knees from doing other sorts of jobs._

 _Dreams traded cheap for a shot of spice._

 _She certainly didn't mean to die like this, next to a toilet—though it's probably where she belongs—some camera guy's finger shoved down her throat to make her cough up the spice while another camera guy holds her head, said camera guys having found her ringing death's doorbell. The fact that these camera guys are saving her life makes it sound like they actually care about her, but the truth is that she's their business. Without her, their show is done, because they're paid to follow her following_ him _. That's all she is to them and she knows it. They don't really care if she dies._

 _And it makes her vicious._ Show's over _, she thinks without consciously trying to actually think, the knowledge somehow there, involuntarily, like how the lungs know how to breathe until they just don't anymore._ I'm done. _Her life swirling down the drain._

 _And it makes her kind of happy, a victory of sorts because her dyin' will ruin the show, it'll ruin_ him, _it'll ruin dreams._

 _So when she sees the light coming through the window and she's still there, scraped raw inside and out, there isn't anything left._

 _Those two cameramen are so happy she's still alive that they don't ask any questions, assuming that she's happy to be alive too. They don't know what she's decided, that she's done, that she'll go back to Forks a failure, that's right a failure, a failure I tell you, because there's nothing left of her for Cullen to take, nothing she can give so she's done._

 _Cullen_ Cullen _Cullen whom she hates more than she ever thought she could hate someone if she could just feel anything inside of her anymore._

You took everything from me _she's going to say to him except there isn't even enough left for that—_

 _The place is a wreck. The cleaners're coming in an hour, and there're empty bottles and broken cups all over the place, lost earrings and stray cufflinks, bowties and broken heels, the aftermath of debauchery, a wild party "and how," where the spice was prime and the liquor flowing._

 _She's making her way through the ruins. She's broken and everything around her's broken and she's going home broken but at least she's leaving._

 _Then she sees him—_ Cullen— _standing back-lit against the window. That son-of-a-bitch who's taken everything from her._

 _She isn't going to say anything. She's just going to creep out the way she came. Just go and go and go and go—_

 _He's heard her though, and he's swung around and she sees him for the first time it seems in the full light in his true aspect._

 _His face gaunt and his eyes standing out in his skull and the spark in them all gone, just black holes, because he's sick and he's been sick for a while._

 _She realizes that he's dying._

 **AN:**

 **Thank you for reading.**

 **Yes, I grew up in a trailer park.**

 **My favorite cinematic treatment of existentialism is Parker Posey's movie** _ **The Party Girl**_ **.**

 **My favorite cinematic treatment of Buddhism is** _ **Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, and Spring.**_

 **A good introduction to the desert fathers is Harmless'** _ **Desert Christians**_ **(this book is also useful with regard to tracing the Nag Hammadi scholarship)** _ **.**_

 **Rec:** Without A Smile by melistories "I hardly slept last night as it was. Mr. Cullen ran out of the office shortly after I stopped and I thought about boxing up my things but decided to wait until I was officially fired before doing anything rash." "You mean rash like breaking out in a song-and-dance routine in front of your boss?" Rosalie snickered. Twilight - Rated: T - English - Romance/Humor - Chapters: 34 - Words: 59,584 - Reviews: 2505 - Favs: 1,184 - Follows: 1,589 - Updated: Jun 21 - Published: May 28, 2015 - Bella, Edward – Complete


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: Meyer owns all.**

Chapter 4

It just seems like any other day when I wake up.

Nevertheless I somehow sense that it would be wrong to just lay there daydreaming. I'm too fuzzy with sleep to remember exactly why it's wrong—more wrong than the usual _why-are-you-wasting-your-life-daydreaming?_ —I just somehow know it is.

But I feel like crap and I don't know how I can face the day. So instead of using the snooze button on my alarm to catch some more sleep, I use it to daydream.

 _It started out as just a scent. Something lingering that he couldn't quite get a hold of._

 _Like a memory, just on the brink of retreating into oblivion._

 _Like a dream, disappearing on the point of waking._

 _A rat-tat-tat on his skull. Tapping tapping tapping._

 _It grew louder over time. A smell with sound. It grew technicolor, too. Tapping tapping tapping tapping tapping until his head was pounding with lights blazing a piercing pain right in the center of his skull._

 _And it happened every time she came around._

 _Young ingénue, Bella Swan, sky's the limit, she's in it to win it, all around good girl next door, here in Hollywood to become a star. Every time he sees her, it's like an ice pick between the eyes._

 _But she's got talent a mile long. He can tell from her work, from the film shorts he picked out personally, because no way was he doing this show with the producers' pick of no-talent fresh-faced media whores. Man of the hour, big man on campus, first-time director Edward Cullen's not going to saddle himself with some dancehall floozy who doesn't know her way around a camera._

 _This is his time to shine, no one note show-tune fiddler._

 _And what a gimmick. The public'll eat it up. Edward Cullen making his directorial debut, accompanied by a hometown girl making it big, Trilby to his Svengali, working as his personal assistant in return for his mentorship—never mind that he's new to this himself!—their antics broadcast into everyone's home once a week, a sure fire hit. And when the actual movie comes out? Blockbuster for sure._

 _It's lookin' good, too. Sitting in the dark at the end of every day, watching the dailies, it's lookin' promising. Cullen's as much of a genius behind the camera as he is in front of it. By the time the film wraps, there's enough buzz to guarantee nominations. And the party to celebrate the wrap is wild._

 _But that was last night. The cleaners're coming in an hour, and there's empty bottles and broken cups all over the place, lost earrings and stray cufflinks, bowties and broken heels, the aftermath of debauchery._

 _He's standing in a window looking out at the sun coming up over the desert and he can smell her coming, just like he can always smell her coming, a dagger to the brain, and when he turns around he can see it in her eyes. She knows he's dying._

 _Things he never wanted anyone to know, he knows she knows, just looking at him right now._

 _It doesn't matter. Scum-bag lawyers and dirt-bag producers have seen to it that she can't run her mouth. He owns her._

 _He's been thinking about putting a bullet in his head. Save the doctors some trouble. If the surgery doesn't kill him, it'll probably leave him a vegetable, so what's it matter if she knows? The rest of the world'll find out soon enough._

 _But then he smiles. A death mask._

 _Because that would be fitting, wouldn't it? She was his first symptom. The headaches he'd get whenever she'd come around and he'd smell that smell that was so inherently_ her _. It was only fitting that she be the first to know the truth. And she can't say a fucking word about it._

 _"I have a tumor," he says. And shrugs. "A brain tumor."_

 _It's not fair. It isn't her fault. But he can't help thinking, every time he looks at her, of his skull just splitting in half._

 _He laughs. "Do you know how many times I've fantasized of trepanning myself? You know what that is, right? Cutting off a piece of my skull and slicing off a chunk of my brain." Anything to make the pain stop._

 _Ring a bell and a dog salivates, after all. We're just animals. And every time he would see her, his brain would seize up. So he can't help blaming her. Illogical as it is, he can't help wanting to hold her responsible._

 _He tells her how hard he's been working to keep it all a secret, at least until the film wrapped. And now that it has, he has no reason not to get the surgery. Except that it'll probably leave him a drooling, simpering mess. He doesn't want the world seeing him like that, does he? What he needs, is a dog on a leash and an iron-clad confidentiality agreement. Someone to oversee his recovery and keep the news from leaking._

 _How convenient, then, that her contract says that he's got her at his beck and call for another six months._

When my snooze alarm goes off again, I remember what happened the night before and I realize just why it seems so fucked up that I'm laying here in bed, fantasizing.

I found a dead body last night.

There's a cacophony of sound in my head—

I don't want to think about that. I don't want to think about anything. I just want to lay in bed and daydream.

I do think about calling in sick. But I've just had a vacation and will have to leave work early to go to the police station. Besides, the new semester at school is starting soon and I can't afford to get behind at work with Comps coming up.

So I get ready and leave my apartment only a few minutes late.

Walking to the subway, I stay well away from the alley where I found the dead body. There's still police tape up and I spy a gawker who's paused in wonderment at the loss of his shortcut, muttering to himself about crime rates in the city.

My subway card doesn't work and I go to the kiosk for help and the woman on duty glares at me for disturbing her, even though the first words out of my mouth to her were an apology, and I don't know how I'm going to make it through the day when the world is already so angry at me. I think that my skin hurts.

I have to buy a new subway card and she says that I can mail my old card to the main office and maybe— _maybe_ —I'll get my money back. But the cost to my soul of writing and sending that letter and handling the reply, not to mention what it took to speak to the angry attendant, already seems like much more than the twenty-five dollars I've lost.

The subway is more crowded than usual and I feel nauseated, trying to hold onto the bar without actually touching it and wondering if it really is necessary for the man next to me to be standing so closely, his body "inadvertently" swaying against mine whenever the train makes the slightest turn and the warmth of his body positively burning through his suit so that I wonder how he hasn't caught fire.

At first he doesn't move when I turn to get off and I have to say "Excuse me" three times, like an asshole, before he'll budge and I think that maybe _this_ is why people throw themselves in front of trains, to fuck up the lives of men like this. It's so obnoxious, throwing yourself in front of a train, making sure that people will remember you in death. If I ever kill myself, I'll go somewhere where no one will ever find me. I'll take care of everything before I go, sell or give away everything, return the keys for my apartment to the landlord, quit my job and pay all my bills and give my family some bullshit story so that no one will be looking for me. I'll make sure that no one will ever find my body, because I know how people make fun of suicides, which is probably just a coping mechanism, but I think that I shouldn't have to put up with it, not in death. And anyhow, as my last gift to the world, I want to be sure that I don't leave a mess. I want to be forgettable. Disappear.

I trip on the stairs coming up out of the subway and no one says anything or even makes a move to help me. So who knows? Maybe I've disappeared already. A see-through person.

I suppose it's because I'm not pretty. I have to try just to look passable. Pretty women aren't see-through. They get doors held open for them and job offers and receive general interest from the population at large, proof that being pretty is evolutionarily advantageous. Translation: I shouldn't even be here.

If a crime's been committed, ugly people are suspected first. There're studies to prove it: Given photos of kids along with narratives of little crimes that the kids have committed, like throwing rocks at dogs, people always let the pretty kids off. "Here is a basically good child," the subjects invariably write, "sometimes driven to less than sterling behavior, but inherently good." The ugly kids aren't so lucky.

I pick myself up off of the stairs and blink fast so that the lone tear in the corner of my eye doesn't fall— _I won't cry, I won't_ —and race up the rest of the steps even though my knee is throbbing.

I think about taking a bus the last three blocks to my office building but I _can't_ , I _can't_ stand in that line or face the bus driver or jockey for position on the bus or bear the agonizing wait to pull the bell—not too early, not too late—with the other commuters thinking what they will about me ( _She took the bus just to go three blocks?_ ). So I limp to work, feeling dirty already with the stink of the subway ride and the lingering heat of the man who kept pressing up against me on the subway and the filthy stairs I fell on and the sneer of the attendant at the kiosk.

Once I'm in the office, I wash my hands and tell myself it's okay, that I'm okay, because I don't think I'll make it otherwise. I don't dawdle getting my coffee though, because there's a crowd in the break room and I can't face any of my co-workers. Instead I log on to my computer and go right to work and don't get up until my supervisor comes in.

I don't want to tell her exactly why I have to leave early, but what else can I do?

She's all sympathy. Faked or not, I will take it, but now she's looking at me like I'm Humpty Dumpty and she wants to try to put me back together again. Fortunately, the jagged edges of my broken shell must be showing because she's looking at me like I'm bleeding so badly that she's afraid to touch me for fear of making it worse. And it _would_ , it _would_ make it worse if she tried to touch me, but she doesn't so I'm okay.

Back at my desk, I wonder if she's already looking online for details of the murder. I open up a browser and run a search for information about the incident, but I don't learn much. The articles don't mention me at all and there're no details about the victim's life or why he might have been killed.

After the police arrived, I was escorted out of the alley. But before I was led away, I saw enough to know that he—whoever the victim was—must have been either shot or stabbed. There was too much blood for it to have been anything else.

I know it wasn't robbery though. I watched the police pull out the victim's wallet.

I can imagine hating someone enough to want to kill him. I remember how I felt when everything was going on with V and J.

I wanted them out of my life. And more. I wanted them to pay for what they'd done to me.

But to act on the desire for vengeance? How does a person do that?

I remember going online for advice about how to deal with the two of them. But for some reason, there aren't many sites devoted to recovering from a doomed friendship. Like it's not supposed to hurt bad enough to require that kind of effort.

In the end, I had no choice but to turn to the sites devoted to overcoming failed romances, which just pissed me off even more, because it was like confirmation of V's bullshit about my feelings for J.

 _Forget J_.

None of the advice worked either.

I was supposed to make lists of V and J's bad traits. A list of their failings apparently reminding me why I was better off without them.

So I was on an endless loop, all day long, listing the things that I hated about them, going over and over conversations we'd had, things that they'd done—a steady background chatter as I worked or as I walked through the grocery store, as I tried to study—and that was _before_ I'd "broke up" with them. I _knew_ what was wrong with them and I still wanted them.

Listing their bad traits wasn't going to help.

If meditation (like prayer) works because it centers your thoughts and concentrates your focus, then why not a candle and a crystal? There was advice on the color of candle I should use if I wanted to rid myself of negative energy and the most effective kind of crystal for overcoming heartache. I drove all of the way out to F— to find a shop that sold the stuff.

The shop girl smiled too widely and said "Blessed be" when she gave me the change. And I said, "Umm yeah," and ran, like an asshole, all for nothing, because the candle and the crystal didn't work, obviously, because I still missed them, goddammit.

If I was really and truly desperate, of course, I knew that there was another option.

I could get a different color candle and a different crystal. There're spells in the _Papyri graecae magicae_ for making one of the dolls, and archaeologists have found little wax figurines of women stuck with pins. A guy who'd been cursed with a voodoo doll went to a Christian shrine near Alexandria for help. Maybe his problems had nothing to do with that doll, perhaps the doll only made a difference insofar as it was tied to the a wholesale assault on the psychological defenses that, according to real scientists, bolster the immune system. But if the world really exists and everything's really connected—chaos theory—then why shouldn't it have been the voodoo doll that actually did him in?

I would have been well within my rights. I mean after we got back from that island, V actively went about trying to hurt me—her fucking humming and her fucking music and her strategic socializing like a fucking knife in my chest—while I sat there doing nothing, quiet as a fucking mouse.

I would have been entitled to some defensive measures. Some offensive measures.

But was that really who I was? Could I have actively tried to hurt her?

Could I afford to continue doing nothing?

During my mother's brief stint with Neo-Paganism, she told me that the only real rule with magic was to harm no one.

The fact that it was my _mother_ handing out a dictum like this was strange enough. My mother was the very incarnation of harm. She didn't need to lay a finger on you. She just had to open her mouth.

Besides, it didn't make sense to me that Neo-Pagans could claim that they never harmed anyone with their magic. If magic worked, then the people who used it were at the very least changing things, weren't they? And change has effects.

It's like praying. Even if you're just praying to get over a hurt and not praying that the person who hurt you is somehow punished. Chaos theory again—there's ripple effects to change, both good and bad. There's no such thing as a surgical strike, whether the entity driving the drone is the Great Mother Goddess, El, YHWH, Allah, Krishna, or Buddha.

So assuming that I believed in God and/or magic—which was a big leap considering that I questioned the existence of the world—then religion was a little too much like drone warfare. It was all too likely to miss its target. And I didn't want to be one of the assholes behind the bad intelligence. So I wouldn't pray and I wouldn't try to cast a spell.

 _This is why monks withdraw from society_ , I thought. _Knowing people means getting hurt and getting hurt makes you violent_.

I wouldn't give into temptation though. I kept my mouth shut and my head down.

And look where that got me. V and J have been gone for months and I'm still hurting. Still angry.

V was always telling me that I was volatile.

And I have a temper. I know that because I _do_ in fact often have angry thoughts—I considered actually cursing that bitch after all—it was crazy for her to complain about this though, considering that I always ended up doing whatever she wanted. If my temper was really all that bad, then how come I never got my way? Until the day I stopped talking to them altogether of course. But I didn't really get what I wanted then either, did I? Because I lost V and J.

So I _never_ did get what I wanted, did I?

And which of us used physical violence in the end? Not me.

I was just so fucking _docile._

I remember again how V once said that I must make a great mess, throwing things whenever I had one of my little temper tantrums.

Her remark confused me at first. I couldn't remember having thrown a single thing out of rage in my entire life (except for a math book in the seventh grade but that didn't count because it was math, which is predicated on the existence of a world that might not exist).

But when V said that, I let a beat pass while I thought over her comment. And then I nodded and said that it did. It did make a great mess when I threw things during one of my little tantrums.

I fucking _nodded_.

Because I always did just whatever she said. I _became_ just whatever she thought that I should be.

How is it possible that she knew me so poorly?

I wonder if she somehow saw a secret part of me that I don't even know myself. An angrier, more violent part.

Or maybe it was that she _wanted_ me to be that person—the one who was out control—so that she could justify telling me what to do. Make me into some sort of beast that she was could enjoy trying to tame.

Because in her head she was one of those awesome, monster-defying monks, totally at peace with herself and the world, Buddha in her back pocket.

I admit that, on that island, I took a swing at V, but it was in self-defense. She'd already laid hands on me by then and my so-called swing hardly connected, my arm flailing weakly.

I've never learned how to fight. My parents were both Corpmen, long before I was born, and yet they claimed to be pacifists, as nonsensical as that sounds, and they said that I should never put up a fight. My mother said if I was ever attacked by a rapist, that I should just let my attacker do whatever he wanted because my mother would rather have me raped and alive then raped and dead. My father was drafted into the military—it was Vietnam—so maybe he didn't have a choice, but he could have run away to Canada, and in fact my mother said that he went AWOL twice during his service. I think that he went into the military only because he was too scared to run, which is the same reason why I think he stays with my mother. My mother wasn't drafted, of course, but she was trying to get away from her family. And she stayed in the military until her time was up because she's never been afraid of anything in her life, except maybe her family whom she's never let us meet, and she doesn't leave my father because she enjoys claiming to be his victim.

As bad as my parents get, they've never laid hands on me or my brother. They are pacifists after all. Yet there's a screaming black abyss whenever I let myself think of them and that trailer in G— where they're still living.

And if I'm evidence of what can be done without even touching a person in violence, I can't imagine the kind of anger it must take to actually lay your hands on someone and murder him.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

I've never been inside a police station before. It's less hectic than I imagined it would be, but I still have to dig my fingernails into the flesh of my palms to keep the panic from overwhelming me as I traverse the maze of desks and personnel, trying not to meet anyone's eyes.

I calm down slightly when I sit down with the sketch artist, a pang of disappointment setting in when I realize that she's going to use a computer program instead of a sketchpad. For some reason, I think it would be so much more romantic to have a drawing.

My heartbeat starts to pick up again when we hit our first roadblock. The sketch artist is nice to begin with, but I realize that that's just a front.

I can tell that she's particularly annoyed that I'm not sure about the gender of the person I saw in the parking lot. Of the person whose reflection I _think_ that I saw.

The image she comes up with at last is so indistinct that it could be anyone, the blur of circles and squares that make up the face easily transposable from person to person. But I've never been any good with things like that. I remember words, not faces. Ideas, not names. I think it's because I'm a megalomaniac. I only care about myself.

Except for my family. I also hate them though.

I'm so grateful when she gives up and tells me that I can go, but getting away turns out to be a little harder than that. It was stupid of me to think that it might be easy.

The detective from the previous night has loomed up in front of me, like he was waiting for me to be finished this whole time. I wonder what this means, that he would wait for me like this.

I don't like the way that he's looking at me either. Like he thinks I'm a criminal. Or maybe that's just the way that all cops look at everyone, yet it makes me feel guilty, and I'm not even sure what I've done.

But we're in a police station already—a gauntlet of officers and criminals between me and the exit—so it's not like I can just run away.

Head down, I follow the detective back to an interrogation room. The scene from _Laura_ where Dana Andrews questions Gene Tierney in the police station flashes before my eyes. I don't think this is going to be anything like that.

After all, my detective's nothing like Dana Andrews, who was kind of ugly actually, but had the most sensitive eyes. You can see when Dana's face hardens, too, like he's putting on an act. My detective's better looking, maybe, but he hasn't got nice eyes and his face is always hard, always angry. And I'm definitely not Gene Tierney. I don't look like a model and no Clifton Webb will ever say of me that I make him want to be a better person.

The interrogation room has a dirty yellow table and the walls are lime green. One of those funny mirrors is hanging on the wall and I wonder if someone is watching. The detective offers me coffee but I've seen _Law & Order_ so I know better than to accept. At least, there's no spotlight in my eye like there was in Gene Tierney's. No third-degree.

Nevertheless, I consider asking for a lawyer. Thanks to reforms after 9/11, I'm not even sure if I still have the right to a lawyer. _Can't they just lock me up? They don't even have to charge me_. In antiquity, prison was rarely used as a punishment for condemned criminals. Prison was usually reserved for people awaiting trial and for witnesses who might otherwise run. The pagan orator Libanius once complained to an emperor about Christian magistrates who were just letting accused criminals languish in prison—where prisoners suffered from want of food, water, space and air, to say nothing of the fact that these prisoners were usually chained up. It seems that Christian magistrates preferred to leave people in prison rather than conduct the trial, because trials inevitably involved torture, at least for non-elites. I have visions of Black Ops sites and waterboarding, which is ridiculous. I didn't do anything wrong.

Even if I did, they can't possibly suspect me of something heinous enough to warrant seizure and torture.

But that's the point of state violence, isn't it? The injudicious use of strength.

And I've been on the verge of a panic attack since I walked into this police station. I haven't got any money or any friends and my family is crazy. The police can do whatever they want to me and no one would notice or care.

The detective's got me alone, too. I wonder where his partner is. After all, don't they always run in pairs? I'm not going to ask, though. I don't want to point out that I've figured out that he doesn't want witnesses when it comes to me, which must mean that he's going to try something especially shady, even though everyone knows that cops always cover for each other.

"So, why were you in that alley last night?" the detective asks me once he's taken a seat, eyeing the way that I'm fidgeting.

I clasp my fingers together, willing myself to sit still. "To get home," I say, _again_ , having told this story so many times (to two or three police officers last night in _addition_ to the detective) that I'm starting to feel like it's not even about me. Like it's a story about a story that might have been about someone who knew someone I knew.

"But why the alley? It's pretty dirty. And the streetlight's broken. Why would a young woman like you want to walk down an alley like that?"

"It's a shortcut."

"A dangerous shortcut."

"The long way around is just as dangerous. Just danger spread out. The alley crams it all into one space so you get it over with." I'm trying to make this sound logical even though I know that it doesn't.

"Danger? It's just a sidewalk."

"There might be people."

"Normally, a young woman like you feels safer when there are more people around."

"But they might want to bother you." And I feel so small and inadequate saying that. I wish that I could just disappear.

"Why were you out so late?" he switches topics.

"I went out with coworkers."

"No one came home with you?"

I'm confused. "Came home with me?"

"You know, did one of your coworkers accompany you?"

I know that my cheeks are burning. "No. No one came home with me. I wouldn't do that."

He's trying to seem conciliatory now, but it's not working. "I can be discreet, you know. It doesn't have to get back to your boss."

"No one came home with me," I repeat a bit too vehemently. Then I worry that this just makes it sound like I'm lying.

He watches me for a few beats before he sighs. "It's just as well. But you know, it would help if we could get someone to corroborate your story about the guy in the garage."

"I didn't say there was a guy in the garage."

He looks at me reproachfully. "You just sat down with a sketch artist."

"I didn't say it was a guy." I'm not letting him confuse me into contradicting myself. The sketch resembles a man, but it could also be a woman.

"What time did you leave the bar?"

"Can't my Metro card tell you when I entered and left the subway?" I won't try to guess. I'm going to make him work for it.

But he doesn't even bother to respond to that one, changing topic again. "One of your coworkers left at the same time as you."

I realize that the police must have already tried to confirm my story. I don't remember anyone leaving the bar with me though. "If you say so."

"How much did you drink?"

"Less than a glass."

"You didn't take a sip out of anyone else's drink?"

I remember K making us all try her margarita. "Just a sip."

"You seemed a little confused last night. Like maybe you'd had more than one drink."

"I'm not a heavy drinker."

"Why not? You don't like your coworkers?"

"I just—I just don't. That's all. No reason."

"You don't go to many of these happy hours, do you?"

"No."

"Trying to avoid someone?"

"Avoid someone?"

"A coworker maybe. You had an affair and it ended badly and now it's hard to see him around. Especially outside of work. So you usually skip happy hours."

"I'm not seeing anyone."

"But you _were_ seeing someone."

"No." He can't possibly know about V and J. And I wasn't _seeing_ them, not the way he means. Besides, V and J can't possibly have anything to do with this.

"Then why don't you like to go out drinking with your coworkers?"

"It's—I'm awkward." I wish this was already over.

"Awkward?"

"I don't get along with my coworkers. I don't like drinking and it's awkward." Isn't it obvious?

"Why do you go if you don't like them and you don't like drinking?" he asks as if he's genuinely stumped, but I know that he's just trying to catch me in a lie.

"Because you're supposed to. You're supposed to go to happy hours and have a beer even if you don't want to. To seem social." Everyone knows this.

"So you didn't stay long?"

"I left as soon as I could."

"But one of your coworkers left at the same time."

"I didn't know that."

"Why would he leave at the same time as you? Doesn't he like going to happy hours?

"I don't know." I don't even know just who it is he's talking about.

"Could he have followed you home on the subway?"

"I was alone." I try to picture the scene again, even though I'm not good at things like that. There's no point in being observant about a world that holds zero interest for me. "No one else was walking out of the station."

"Except for the guy in the parking lot. The one you saw."

It only takes me a few seconds to recover."He must have already been there."

"You just said that you weren't sure that it was a guy."

"Him. Her. Whoever."

"And didn't you say that you weren't sure if it was a trick of the light?"

"It might have been a trick of the light."

"What'd you call it? Pareidolia? I looked it up. You were right, that's what it's called. Why d'you use big words like that when you can just say 'trick of the light'?"

I don't know. Why do I do that?

And now he's looking at me like I'm a problem he's trying to solve. The suspicion's gone, but this isn't much better. "You know," he says in a softer tone, almost like he's confiding in me. "We sometimes get witnesses who try to inject themselves into cases. They do their civic duty in reporting what they know, which is great, they've done the right thing. And that gives them a sense of importance. So they try to help a little more. They even make stuff up sometimes. Things that aren't true. Because they're trying to help."

I don't have anything to say to that.

He asks again. "Did you see anyone in the garage?"

"I don't know."

"You went home alone?"

"I was alone." Why can't he just believe me?

"How long did you wait to call 911 after you found the body?"

"I didn't wait. I called right away."

"The time stamp on your Metro card says you exited the station eighteen minutes before you called 911. Are you telling me it took you eighteen minutes to walk 400 yards?"

 **AN:**

 **Thanks for reading.**

 **For the story about the guy going to a Christian shrine for help after being cursed with a voodoo doll, see Gager's** _ **Curse Tablets and Binding Spells from the Ancient World**_ **262-63. For instructions on making one of these dolls see IV 296-321 in** _ **The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation,**_ **translated by Hans Dieter Betz.**

 **Libanius** _ **Oration**_ **45 in** _ **Loeb Classical Library.**_

 **Rec:** _ **Operation: Merry Christmas**_ **by nicnicd - When Bella, alone for Christmas, bumps into a shy and quiet coed outside of her dorm will her negative outlook on the Holidays change? My submission to the Twilight Gift Exchange on LJ. Twilight - Rated: M - English - Romance/Humor - Chapters: 9 - Words: 19,796 - Reviews: 291 - Favs: 384 - Follows: 188 - Updated: Mar 2, 2010 - Published: Mar 1, 2010 - Bella, Edward – Complete**


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephanie Meyer.**

It's been almost a week since I found a dead body.

I was shocked when the detective told me how long it had taken for me to go from the Metro station to the alley and to call 911. I wondered at first if he was lying to me. I knew that cops were allowed to do that. Then I thought again about asking for a lawyer, but I didn't know how much a lawyer would cost. So instead I said that the time stamp on the machine at the Metro must have been wrong—the clock badly calibrated or something—but the detective said that he had checked it himself and that while the clock _was_ a couple minutes off, even taking that into account, it still took me eighteen minutes to find the body and call 911.

I said that I must have dawdled.

"Dawdled? It was an empty Metro station after dark and you're a young female." The implication was clear: What on earth could have possibly possessed me to dawdle?

I couldn't give him an answer. After all, I didn't remember dawdling. I remembered hurrying—because I _am_ a young female and it _was_ an empty Metro station after dark. But I couldn't for the life of me figure out what took me so long.

I already knew that there weren't any cameras in that part of the garage where I had imagined seeing someone. But were there any other cameras in the area?

Reluctantly, the detective confirmed that there were indeed other cameras.

Well, what was I doing on them?

Even more reluctantly, the detective said that I was dawdling.

That didn't help me very much. I wanted to know specifically how I was dawdling. _Was I just standing around aimlessly? Did I seem like I was waiting for something? For someone? A Tulpa?_ But I knew that I couldn't ask questions like that.

Instead I said that that if the police had footage of me dawdling, then the detective knew damn well (I might have cursed, which I know you're not supposed to do when you're talking to cops and judges) that no one had come home with me. My declaration was like a dare: _Tell me, did anyone come home with me?_

The detective shrugged, confirming that indeed I appeared to be alone.

I stood, because I was going, unless he was going to arrest me. He couldn't keep me is, even with the recent deterioration of our civil liberties, I didn't _think_ that he could keep me there _._

He said that I could go, but asked me not to leave town.

 _Was he serious?_ How many people actually worked in the same town where they lived? Besides, I had school and my family. And I didn't think that cops actually made requests like this in real life.

He amended his request to ask me not to leave the state.

I wondered what that meant (in terms of my ranking in the pool of suspects) and whether or not such a request was legally binding and wanting—no _needing—_ to demand to know if he was responsible for the fact that my subway card no longer worked. Didn't I deserve a reimbursement?

But I fled without saying another word.

I couldn't sleep that night. So for once I did something useful. I stayed up all night studying.

Carlo Ginzburg wrote this really fascinating piece about how historians are like detectives following clues. It makes me feel like there's actually something worthwhile to being a historian, that it's not just a profession for dilettantes. And I keep waiting for this magic moment where everything clicks and I've figured out something no one else has figured out. In my head, the scene has got this romantic sepia tinge. I imagine that I'm in the Library of Congress and I've just faced down one of those bitch archivists—they always make you feel like you're a criminal, just for wanting to look at a book—and I'm studying a volume of published ostraca when I find a slip of paper stuck between the pages, a letter written by the granddaughter, perhaps, of some British administrator who was in charge of Egyptian waterworks or something, and this letter mentions the recent discovery of a manuscript (like the Coptic texts they found still sitting on those shelves at White Monastery), and additional research on my part shows that said manuscript somehow managed to slip everyone's attention (their disinterest making sense in the wake of the violence surrounding Egypt's fight for independence). If I could come across a new test, my career would be set.

Barring that, best case scenario is that I come up with yet another boring rendition of known facts that tweaks the details just enough to pass as original scholarship.

Not that there aren't still mysteries. Consider, for instance, the outbreak of ethnic violence in Alexandria in the first century BCE. Jews blamed the Greeks. The Greeks blames the Jews and the Egyptians. And even today people are still fighting about what really happened.

It wasn't very likely that I'd come up with something new-some earthshaking reassessment of the evidence-but I was trying. And I was working so hard that I didn't think about daydreaming even once.

The next morning, I didn't have to convince myself to go to work. It wasn't as if I'd enjoyed reading about all of the horrible things that people can do to one another (the fighting in Alexandria was so bad that there were lumps of flesh in the street), but I was proud of the progress I'd made in my research. And I I was looking forward to throwing myself into the day, like there was a whole world of potential accomplishment just out there waiting for me.

The blush of promise had yet to be slapped out the day as I made my way to the break room for coffee, and such were my hopes for it that I went so far as to smile at K, which I realize now was a mistake, because I've never liked K (she is too supercilious, a word that I've never really known the meaning of, but is, I think, a bad thing to be and therefore exactly what she is).

She frowned. "The police have talked to me."

My spirits plummeted headlong into the abyss where good moods go when things start looking bleak as I realized that everyone at work already knew out about the dead body, or soon would. The police had obviously gone to my coworkers in order confirm my alibi.

My _alibi_.

K said that she hoped that I was okay, still frowning.

I said that I was fine, at a loss to say anything more definitive, then amended my statement to "As fine as I can be, given the circumstances," because I knew that I wasn't supposed to be fine after finding a dead body.

"Why didn't you tell us about it?"

I half-shrugged my shoulders, half-waved a hand, as if to say that I couldn't bear to put a burden like that on anyone else.

"We're here for you," she assured me.

I felt my eyes widen in surprise and I couldn't help backing away when she reached out to pat my arm. Her eyes narrowed.

"I did think it was a little strange though," she said.

"Strange?"

"That you didn't tell us yourself. We had to hear about it from the police."

"Why is that strange?" I didn't want her to explain however, so I added "I don't think the police wanted me to talk about it anyhow."

"But we're your friends."

My _friends?_

She went on. "It could have been any of us."

Any of them?

She clarified. "Any one of us could have found that body."

Not unless they suddenly decided to take the silver line, and took it in the opposite direction of their apartments.

I left that alone, but my annoyance showed when I replied. "Why would I want to talk about it? It wasn't exactly pleasant."

"We could have comforted you."

"Comforted me?"

"You're so secretive. I mean after that stuff with V—"

I cut her off before she could even finish saying the bitch's name. "I don't like people prying into my life, that's all."

"Well," she huffed, "if that's how you feel about it."

I went to my desk and tried to do some work after that, but it was no good. It was only 9:21 in the morning, and I was already pissed.

And I was pissed that I was pissed. Like V was right about my temper. She was always accusing me of being so irrational.

Wanting to prove to myself that it wasn't irrational to be pissed, I made a list of the things that I was pissed about, carefully leaving out the incident in the break room because I knew it was irrational to let something like that piss me off.

 _ **Things I'm already pissed about today at 9:21:**_

 _L saying that she has questions for me about the new system when her real problem is that she doesn't feel like doing the training._

 _CG from site monitoring blowing off my question about where the f she put that document, and sending me an f'ing document library quick start to show me how to find her f'ing documents. (Hey idiot, I can't find them if I don't know what you misnamed them. Hag.)_

 _DB telling me that she has to see me to talk about my edits. Well I hope she has fun trying to find where they moved my desk_ (because I'd been moved again, this time to a tiny cubicle in the corner of the building where no one could talk to me or see me or hear me or suffer to be reminded in any way that I was still alive) _. I_ won't _send her an email or call her to make sure she knows that my desk has been moved though, because f her._

 _And that ass from IT telling me it's a "known bug." A GD_ known bug. _Like that makes it my fault that it's keeping me from doing my job._

The truth was that I couldn't stop agonizing over the things that my coworkers must have told the detective about me.

I had no doubt that they had told him all about V and J. Not that they would've explained that V was crazy and J was an asshole. No, instead they would have told him how _I_ was crazy and an asshole, and that _something_ had happened with V and J, something that was clearly shocking, even if they didn't know exactly what it was.

Mulling all of this over, it became clear to me that there wasn't any point in trying to get any work done. (Besides, there was a _known bug_ preventing me from doing anything.) So I started thinking about all of that fighting in first century Alexandria again.

The problem was that the narratives were so biased.

Not that it was easy to piece together a complete and truthful narrative of a crime even these days.

For instance, I just knew that the detective who's investigating the murder I was involved with was looking at it all wrong. He was questioning my coworkers, as if I was a suspect, but they weren't going to be able to give him a clear picture of me.

Oh, I suppose that they could tell him, for instance, about that time I decorated for Christmas with a _Jesse James Wanted Dead or Alive_ poster—white Christmas lights wrapped around a bunch of twigs twined together to look like a tumble weed—as if my choice in decorations is evidence of my perversity. But my coworkers can't explain what those decorations meant, not really.

"It's depressing," J said when he saw the display.

"It's the Wild West," I explained. "People are dyinghere." Meaning that _of course_ Christmas would be depressing. What else could you expect of a town full of widows and outlaws and hookers? It made perfect sense.

But the truth was, _I_ was depressed. Sharing an office with V and spending all of my free time with her and J just sucked the hope and joy out of everything.

My coworkers could tell the detective all about the decorations—they would've seen the poster and the lights for themselves—but they weren't there when I explained it to J. And I doubt that they understood what it really meant. So they couldn't tell the detective that there was in fact an explanation for my behavior.

And I just knew that my coworkers weren't telling the detective the truth about V and J. My coworkers probably didn't know—so they couldn't possibly have told the detective about how J was responsible for supplying the drugs that brought on a friend's psychotic break. Not that it was my place to judge—it was none of my business—but it took J a long time to stop feeling guilty for what happened to his friend, or so he said. Again, I don't judge, I didn't even judge him then, but—

I couldn't help telling J that I thought he was wrong for that, wrong for abandoning his guilt. Because without guilt, who are we? How do we remember to try harder to be better people?

I'd never even met his friend, and yet I could feel it—the terrible burden of his friend's psychotic break weighing on my conscience—as if just hearing the story implicated me.

But then I suppose I'm particularly sensitive to stories about things like that. One of my grandfathers killed himself (he didn't leave a note, which really pissed my mother off, because she thought that he should've left a note confessing his crimes against her, et al, and she was so sure that he would've written a note that she actually suspected the people who had found his body of destroying it, which just pissed her off even more, because they didn't have the right to do that). So perhaps I've got a propensity for mental illness in my family, with my parents' own idiosyncracies being further proof that certain conditions breed true.

Sometimes I think that I can sense it, the edges of my fraying sanity slipping through my fingers.

J thought it was kind of funny, that I was so anxious about things like that. He wanted to know why I was holding on so hard. He dared me to let go, and promised me that it would all turn out fine.

Like going crazy was nothing more or less than getting high.

And if I _did_ happen to have an actual psychotic break, then, _oh well_. I suppose that he wouldn't feel guilty about what had happened to me either.

As if a person's sanity was that insignificant. Like water trickling down the drain.

He was a fucking child playing with firecrackers. A goddamned dilettante, with his perfect fucking suburban childhood, utterly isolating him from real danger.

He had no idea how much effort it took to try and maintain.

And he thought I should just throw it away.

A fucking psych major with no appreciation for the value of mental health.

And at the time, he was studying for the GRE so he could go to grad school to study psychology.

That's why he left the company. He's off at school this very moment. I can just see him with his own practice one day, fucking with his patients' sanity like it's a game.

J always thought he was so much better than me. He never said it, but I know he thought it.

I'm in grad school too though. I'm going places, just like him.

Even I can't help wondering sometimes if there's any point.

I want to live in a lighthouse and read all day and all night. I want to be in charge of making sure the light stays lit for passing ships. I'll never have to talk to anyone.

But lighthouses are all automated these days, and there's not enough room in a lighthouse for all of the books I'd need.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Trying to resign myself to what's real, what's obtainable, I've been forcing myself to study every day.

It's been exactly one week since I found a dead body, and the newspapers have yet to publish an obituary. I've started to wonder if there's even going to be one.

I must have murder on the brain, though, because right now, I'm obsessed with finding George the Cappadocian's murderer because, yeah, it happened sixteen hundred years ago, but I don't see why I shouldn't be the one to figure it out.

The only thing that everyone agrees on is the fact that George the Cappadocian was dragged through the streets of Alexandria and killed in 361. But it's anyone's guess as to who did it and why.

George had threatened to pull down a pagan temple, which suggests that pagans had a motive. But George was himself guilty of torturing supporters of Athanasius, or so Athanasius claimed. This Athanasius was the head of the so-called Orthodox Church in Egypt, but he was too was accused of dealing out a fair share of violence. But if Athanasius was really behind George's death, then why didn't the emperor do something about it? The emperor was a pagan, after all, and he didn't like Athanasius at all.

Epiphanius said that the city as a whole rose up to kill George, on account of his corruption. But an anonymous source says that George's assailants actually pulled him from a prison in order to kill him. So maybe the police were in on it, like they were in on the lynchings of Sam Hose in Georgia in 1898 and Claude Neale in Florida in 1934.

Every scholar who talks about George's murder pretends to have this unique insight. Every scholar acts like he somehow has the inside scoop on the thought processes of people who lived two thousand years ago. But that's a load of crap.

Maybe the fact that no one knows what really happened is the point. Like people are crazy and random and you can't trust them, because they'll kill a person for no reason at all. And that's the only explanation we're ever going to get.

This guy named Larry Griffin wrote an article about how hard it is to pinpoint the causes behind any one incident. About how hard it is to figure out just which precipitating factors can't be done away with if an incident is going to go down the way it does.

For instance, say we've got this guy named Rick. Maybe Rick could skip his morning coffee and this woman named Cindy would still be mowed down in a hit-and-run two hours later.

But maybe Rick _had_ to get his coffee because that's where he handed the cash over to the man he hired to kill Cindy, who just happens to be Rick's mistress.

The problem with a straightforward narrative is that it implies explanatory value. Just putting things in a list makes it sound like causation is involved, each subsequent item on the list occurring _because_ of the one preceding. But that's just a trick of the narrative.

A list is ok so far as it goes. It can't possibly include everything, though. What about the factors it leaves out, the unknown variables without which the results would have been drastically different?

 _Chaos theory_. What if George the Cappadocian died not because he raised taxes (like Epiphanius says) or arrested some virgins (like Athanasius says), but because a flower was picked two centuries earlier in Outer Mongolia?

What if I wandered down that alley next to the subway that night and found a dead body only because I'd been looking for my Tulpa?

Take any event and change the details you're looking at, and see how the story changes. Because there are just so many different sides to any story.

I suppose that even V and J have got their own versions about what happened to us. Not that that matters. Unless of course the detective has contacted them, has gotten _their_ side of what happened and plans to use it against me.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

I have lecture today.

I've always dreaded the first day of school, all of my life. If I had known that home schooling was an option as a child I would have insisted upon it.

My feelings on the subject have not improved as I've aged.

I get to class early and am already sitting there when a fellow grad student that I've known for three years walks in. She doesn't bother to wave "Hi" to me, too busy with her Bluetooth headset like she's in such high-demand that she needs to be ready at an instant's notice to take a call.

She pouts as she sits, not, I think, because she feels bad about being too good to greet me but because she thinks that pouting makes her look cute.

I don't think that the other students in my grad program like me. I think that they resent that I have a full-time job while they have TA-ships and GA-ships. They bitch all of the time about how little money they make, when they actually make more money than the adjuncts _and_ they get benefits, which the adjuncts don't get. Not to mention that they have more free time than me (leaving aside the fact that I do more f'ing around at work than actual work).

I can't afford to live on a TA's salary and support my family. Somehow that makes me a lesser caste among my fellow students.

I wonder if they think the situation's actually the other way around. That I'm the one who thinks she's from a higher caste, like just because I've got a full time job, I think that I'm better than them. It reminds me of that time in high school when what's-her-name told me that people thought that I was a snob. How could I have been a snob? I lived in a trailer park and owned only two pairs of jeans. I'd wear them on alternate days with ugly thrift shop tops. I didn't talk to people, but that was because they treated me like shit. That's not snobbery; it's self-protection.

In lieu of an actual lecture, my adviser presents a slide show of photos from his last vacation in Greece. He's been giving variations of this lecture for as long as I've been taking his classes, for years, probably decades, just updating the slides with his latest vacation pics.

A wall of masonry flashes up on the screen. Then a barren vista, vegetation more brown than green and rubble breaking up the smooth yellow plain under the gray-almost-white sky.

I imagine another dark room, the images flickering by on the screen.

My adviser is pointing out the orientation of the bathhouse and—

I imagine Edward Cullen sitting in a studio, watching the day's rushes.

 _Edward's deal with the studio on hinged his agreement to do a reality show on the making of his film. The reality show would be free publicity, and without it, the studio wasn't willing to take a risk on Edward as a director. He was just another fucking actor in their eyes._

 _Well, he'd show them._

 _And he_ did _—he threw every bit of himself into his film. In fact, he put so much of himself into the film that he wondered sometimes if the film was to blame for his cancer—_

 _Or maybe it was that girl they'd foisted off on him for that reality show—_

 _Which he only agreed to make so that the studio would agree to let him direct._

 _So maybe it was the film after all._

 _Edward knew that he was hard on his staff. Discipline is required for excellence. Fact. He wouldn't apologize for that. But he was fair. He was only treating his staff the same way he'd been treated, back before he made it._

 _Alright, he might have been a bit rougher on his so-called assistant, Swan, but she was just some contest winner. She wasn't an_ artist _. Not yet, even if the film clips she'd used to win that contest showed that she was on the path. There were at least six other contestants just as good as her, but she was the prettiest, the youngest, the sweetest. It was a set-up and everyone knew it._

 _Of course he was the only one who knew about the cancer at first. He was the only one who knew how every time she came around, that smell, that goddamn smell was like a fucking jackhammer to his skull._

 _So yeah he was tough on her. You want to be great, that's what it takes. She might have won a fucking contest, but that didn't make her an_ artiste _. If she wanted to make it, she was going to have to fucking work. Just like him._

 _If only he could ignore that fucking smell._

 _It wasn't her perfume. It wasn't her soap. It wasn't her conditioner or her shampoo. Because he made her change everything, and the smell still lingered. So he barged into the trailer she shared with the extras and dumped the entire contents of the bathroom on the floor, and the producer of that fucking reality show aired every minute of it. He even aired the argument that happened a day later, when she showed up on the set again, that same fucking scent following her._

" _What did I tell you?" Edward barked._

 _And there she was, little Miss Innocent, little Miss Girl Fucking Next Door, looking up at him with those innocent fucking eyes. "Everything's different. I changed everything."_

" _Then it's_ you _. Get the bleep away from me. Stand somewhere bleep else. I can't bleep think with that rank odor."_

 _In episode 3, Edward was supposed to meet with one of the financiers for his film and the son-of-a-bitch kept moving the meeting. Then the fellow picked the most paparazzi-ridden restaurant in downtown on a Saturday afternoon. Running the gauntlet of fans outside the door was a nightmare. Swan's got bruises on her arms going through the front as a distraction while Edward went through the back with his bodyguard. She'd been up all night, too, because of some fuck up with the costumes. But she was looking around the restaurant with stars in her eyes—fucking stars in her eyes—grinning like she just won the lottery because (she told the camera) Darren Aronofsky, Chan Wook Park, and Robert Eggers were all there. She was smiling, that was, until Edward asked her what the bleep she was doing at his table—_ his _table—and told her to get her ass back to the set to make sure they were setting up for tomorrow's scene, because he didn't pay her to eat. The camera showed her in the car on the way back to the set eating a granola bar._

 _Almost every episode had that fucker James, Edward's bodyguard, making a pass at her._

 _And they had an_ entire _episode devoted to the time that Edward was supposed to escort her to the_ Spirit _awards. Swan spent a whole afternoon trying on dresses for Alice, Edward' stylist. Swan was telling the camera how excited she was to be going and naming everyone she was excited to meet. The day of the awards show, she was getting ready when Edward called with a last minute request for her to pick up a prop that just had to be picked up that day—_ had _to be—and so off she went, driving two hours out of town, only to get stuck in traffic on the way back. There was a shot of her sitting in the back of an SUV, in the ridiculous dress that Alice had picked out for her, watching the award's show on her phone._

 _She was supposed to be working on her own projects whenever she has spare time. But she never did seem to have any spare time. The one occasion she asked Edward for his input—because he_ was _"supposed" to be her mentor—he snapped that he didn't have energy for some bleep after school special._

 _When her father visited, she introduced him to everyone on set, but steered him very carefully and very obviously away from Edward, who didn't even realize Bella's father was there and started barking at her at one point to get her ass in gear. She shut a door in a cameraman's face to cut-off the footage of her father pleading with her to come home._

 _The last episode of the season ended with Edward confronting Swan in her trailer after a long day on the set. "I don't know if you thought you could get some press, but this—"Edward's voice was positively sopping with disgust. There was a shot of a computer screen showing a headline on TMZ:_ "Edward and Bella Share a Night out on the Town." _A grainy photo showed Swan leaning towards Edward, looking for all the world as if she was whispering something intimate into his ear._ _What the article didn't mention, what no one seeing the picture could possibly know, was that she'd been whispering that Edward's doctor was on the phone with an urgent message._

 _Edward only knew about the article because those fuckers producing their reality show had casually mentioned it to him. They'd known full well how he'd react—he didn't have time for his so-called personal assistant to be fucking with him like this. They wanted a "big scene" to close the season with._

" _I can't have this kind of behavior from the people I work with," Edward warned Swan, who was clearly at a loss for words at his allegation, her mouth opening and closing. Edward snorted. "Save it. Just don't let it happen again." He turned on his heel and a door slammed off-camera as he left the trailer. There was a close-up of Swan's face as she scrolled through the article. She blinked and stared. Another shot of the computer screen showed that there were already two thousand comments on the article. Two_ thousand _people had commented on the article in the twenty-four hours since it had posted. The name of the first person who commented was blurred out, but the comment itself could be clearly made out: "She's making an idiot out of herself. I wish she would just kill herself."_

I come back to my senses when the lecture starts to wrap up. I'm fairly sure that I haven't missed anything important, but I can't help the lingering regret that I've let myself get carried away by my daydreams again.

It would be typical of my advisor to throw out some invaluable pearl of wisdom right when I'm not listening.

On the way out, I stop at his desk just to make sure that he hasn't forgotten that I exist. He tells me that he wants to "read Greek" with me.

This does not bode well.

He reads Greek with G, a fellow grad student of mine. G is a veritable prodigy when it comes to ancient Greek. My advisor says that he thinks that G might actually read Greek better than he does.

I am not a prodigy when it comes to Greek. I barely scraped by on the exam. Truth be told, if I had known how hard it was going to be to learn ancient Greek, I might have said I wanted to be an Americanist—even though that's just like being a journalist, it's all _modern—_ because for some reason this university doesn't require the fuckers studying American history to pass any language exams at all. How does that make sense? I have to pass four language exams and they don't even have to read Spanish, which is just more proof that Americans really do think that they're the center of the universe.

Walking to the subway, I try to cheer myself up.

The good news is that I'm almost done with my reading list and Comps are only a few short weeks away.

The bad news is that I think that it might be true that people really do lose their fucking minds when they take their Comps.

I hurry to the subway. I have to get some sleep tonight if I'm going to get up early the next morning to study.

And really study, I mean. Not daydream. I can't keep doing this, after all. Comps are less than a month away.

Onboard the train, I pull out a book to read. I do my best to concentrate on the text, but I don't even make it a page before I'm fantasizing again.

" _Hey, it's ok," James tells Bella. "Edward said it was alright."_

 _James, Edward's bodyguard, has got Bella trapped in a corner. He's bigger than her, much bigger, but he's drunk, and his coordination's off. So she's able to push him off of her and get away._

 _When two cameramen find Bella passed out a few hours later, they force her to vomit the pills she's taken._

 _And now, in the morning light, after the hellish wrap party, Bella has decided that she's done. Fuck the contract and fuck Cullen, she's going home, tail between her legs, because she obviously can't make it after all._

 _She's going to tell him to his face—_

 _But then Edward turns to her and says "I'm dying."_

 _There's more too: Edward wants her to help him during his recovery._

 _Of course, it's odd that he'd go to her with something like this. He could get anyone to help nurse him back to health. Yet there's part of him that thinks she owes him. Not just for giving her a job and mentoring her—whatever that means—no, she owes him for every goddamned migraine and nausea-inducing moment, for the fact that he had to put up with the fucking smell that followed her everywhere she went._

 _He's realized by now that this sensitivity to her scent is just one of symptoms—the way this so-called smell of hers is driving him wild. No one else can smell it. He's asked. They think that she smells like strawberries. It's all in Edward's head, quite literally, a fucking tumor screwing with his wiring. So it isn't fair to hold Bella accountable for it. But he can't help it._

 _Besides, she's still under the confidentiality agreement. Their contract was fairly vague about just what she and Edward might be doing together between seasons, but there's no reason she shouldn't continue on as his assistant. She fucking owes him, after all. (Or so he tells himself.)_

 _For her part, she's ready to walk, ready to drop off the face of the fucking planet rather than spend another instant in Edward's presence._

 _Ten thousand dollars, is where he starts. Because it's above and beyond, what he's asking for, he realizes. Because a story like "Edward Cullen has cancer" is worth breaking a confidentiality agreement over. Just one shot of him in bed after his upcoming surgery would probably pay for everything a small town girl like Swan could possibly dream of. He knows that he'll have to pay through the nose._

 _He's already arranged for a nurse to oversee his day-to-day care after the surgery. But he needs someone to keep everyone else away. And he does mean_ everyone _. The media. The fans. His so-called friends. His family._

 _He hasn't seen any of the footage from the reality show yet, having refused to let himself be distracted by all of that while he was working on his film. Nevertheless, he's savvy enough to know that Swan hates him. He hated all of the fuckers that he had to deal with when he was coming up in the business. But he figures she'll play along if he pays enough._

 _And he must be right, because she agrees in the end. For a hundred thousand dollars. A person can do a lot with a hundred thousand dollars, after all. She's already put up with a lot from him. How much worse can it get?_

 _Besides, she says to herself, he might die. And she thinks that she would like to watch him die._

 _At first, it looks like she might get her wish, because he gets worse. Much much much worse._

 _There are whole days when he can't get out of bed. When everything hurts and the meds they have him on don't come close to being enough._

 _There are days when the meds_ are _enough and he's got so much clarity that he feels like he can see through everything, see through the world. He tries to tell Swan about it, because she's the only one there._

 _There are days when he wonders why anyone bothers. Why not just chuck it all in and go for broke?_

 _The fact that he's so sick should maybe make her feel sorry for him. But it does the opposite. It makes her hate him all the more. Because here's this drooling, broken mess of a man. If it were her father lying in that bed, if it were a perfect stranger, she'd feel some sympathy. All she feels is disgust, repulsed by what Edward's become, repulsed at herself for being so cowed by a man like this._

 _Meanwhile, Edward's becoming more and more dependent on her, his last link to the world. He raves, not making any sense. He tells Swan that if he ever has a kid, he'll call it_ Cullen Something Cullen _. Doesn't matter what the_ Something _is, so long as it's_ Cullen Something Cullen _, like_ William Carlos Williams _, a name that sings._

 _He doesn't like it when he can't hear the colors. Does she hear the colors? He suspects that people are only pretending they can't hear them. It's a test really. And if you answer wrong, that it's for you, the cleaners are coming._

 _The color pink tastes like lemonade and Swan smells—_

 _She smells like lavender._

 _Everyone else said that she smelled like strawberries, but he thinks that she smells like lavender._

 _And lavender is for devotion, did she know that? The scent just follows Swan around. It precedes her into the room. It swirls around her as if it's coming straight out of her lungs. She_ is _lavender._

 _Edward never told her that it was only because he was sick, that it was only because the scent was like an icepick between the eyes that he—_

 _The day the icepick finally melts, he knows he's cured. The day that he can smell Swan's scent and it doesn't bring on a headache, Edward knows that he's finally gotten better._

 _The headaches are gone and the side effects from the meds they put him on have mostly worn off._

 _He's starting to get out into the world again. And yeah, he knows he looks like hell, but he figures the media'll just say it was rehab and that's fine with him. He doesn't care what they think._

 _He tells Swan to get him a reservation at that restaurant. "You know the one," he says, "we'll have lunch."_

 _She does as he asks and even escorts him into the restaurant, because she always comes in to make sure the table's ok, but then she leaves. Edward figures she's just stepped into the bathroom but the waitress keeps coming back for his order._

" _Where were you?" he asks Swan, when he finally gives up and goes back to the car._

" _Where do you think?" she asks not even looking at him from the backseat of the car where she's been waiting. She's always like that with him now. Now that he's paying her to hide his illness from the world, now that she's seen him vomit nothing but bile for seven days straight, now that she's had to help him to the toilet. She's always got those sunglasses on too, those fucking sunglasses that everyone starts wearing when they move to Hollywood, not because they can't stand the sun, but because they've got nothing but ice behind the irises, lizard eyes._

" _I was waiting for you," he says._

" _Need me to chew your food for you now too?" she snaps, yeah snaps, because she's nothing but venom now. She hates him so fucking much._

" _I thought we could have a lunch and celebrate," he tells her._

" _How could a lunch with you possibly be a celebration?" she scoffs and for an instant the whole world contracts, nothing but Swan and the black and red of the car seat._

" _I'm feeling better," he explains. "I wanted," he pauses. "I wanted to thank you."_

" _For what?" she asks, sounding bored._

" _Everything," he says, his tone incredulous, because he can tell she's angry but he isn't sure why._

 _She turns her head towards him then, looking at him behind those sunglasses so that he still can't see her eyes and says "You_ pay _me, Mr. Cullen, to_ work _. Don't you remember the last time we came to this little restaurant?"_

 _He doesn't remember. But he doesn't want to admit it. Doesn't want to admit just how much of the past year is a total blur._

 _By the time that the driver's pulled up to Edward's door, Edward's decided he's going to look at those tapes, after all._

 _It's the first time he's felt any inclination to watch that reality show of his—it was just a gimmick, after all—but now it's occurred to him that he made a mistake not paying attention to what was being aired. That maybe he made a mistake agreeing to do the show at all._

 _And now it's all coming as something of a shock, seeing himself like this I mean—seeing the_ real _him, not some manufactured scripted creature, but the_ real _Edward on the screen. Because he's watched his films before, but he was always playing a part. When he decided to do the reality show, he promised himself that he wouldn't act for the camera. He'd be himself, because he would need to devote all of his energy to his directing—not to some bullshit gimmick—_

 _Then he smelled her for the first time._

 _After that, he couldn't have acted if he'd tried._

 _Edward can't believe the fucking producers of that reality show had the balls to air the stuff he's seeing now._

 _Why didn't someone stop them?_

Ha _, that's right. Edward had insisted that he didn't give a shit what they did. All he cared about was his film._

 _The screen flickers and Edward's brother is warning him that all of this might be aired, trying to caution Edward about how he's coming off._

 _Edward is telling his brother to fuck off and then tells Swan to get him another migraine pill._

 _And everyone in America had just sat back and watched. Edward had a fucking tumor growing in his skull and no one fucking noticed. As if it was perfectly believable that he was naturally a complete asshole. As if it wouldn't take an icepick between the eyes to make him act like that._

 _When he's finished watching every episode of that fucking train wreck of a reality show, he hits the internet._

 _Debilitated as he was by his failing health, and with all of his energy going towards the film, Edward had been ignoring the media. It was the film he really cared about._

 _By the time the film was finally released, Edward was too sick to pay more than cursory attention to the response. Still, he was smart enough to know that his manager was spoon-feeding him only the best of the reviews._

 _But he's in recovery now, and he isn't in a mood to be spoon-fed any more bullshit._

 _Of course, Hollywood's nothing but bullshit. Even so, Edward is surprised to see just how little the reviewers had to say about his film. Oh, they all agreed that it was fine enough. A perfectly serviceable entry. But that wasn't what they were really interested in:_

" _The results of Edward Cullen's first turn at directing might very well be a masterpiece, which should be some consolation to the staff he terrorized while making the film—_

" _If the film wasn't so brilliant, the first season of Cullen's reality television series would have been enough to destroy his career forever—_

" _Fortunately for Edward Cullen, the public has a high tolerance for asshole critics who actually deliver—_

" _The zombie sheep hordes who flock after Cullen really proved their devotion this last year, as they continued to support Cullen despite his horrific behavior on his new reality series—_

 _Reading these reviews, watching himself on tv, Edward knows what he has to do._

 _The next day, Edward's driving out to scout a location, or so he tells Bella, but really he just wants Bella in the car with him so that he can talk to her without an interruption. They're just outside of the city when he asks her about her work. He wants to know if she has any script ideas to show him or maybe some footage she's shot._

 _She scoffs, "Yeah right."_

 _He chides her a bit. "I'm your mentor, aren't I? So let me see what you've got. Even if it's crap."_

 _Her voice is just dripping with sarcasm. "I wouldn't want to waste your time."_

" _You embarrassed? The best ideas don't just come to you. Sometimes you've got to grind them out of utter shit—" He's talking out of his ass, of course. He's directed one fucking low budget film and he had to whore himself out just for that. What the fuck does he know?_

 _Bella shrugs_

" _But what about the stuff you showed me before? Where's that going?"_

" _I threw it out."_

" _What?"_

" _It's gone."_

" _But—" The notion that she'd just get rid of her work is—it's inconceivable. "How could you do that?" He shakes his head. "It's your art."_

" _Well, I guess you were right after all. I'm not really an artist."_

And that's as far as I can get this particular daydream.

It's stuck there. Because everything after that—it's all fake.

The best Bossward fanfictions have got the worst Bosswards. You hate them. You want them to pay for what they've done. And I've made this Edward a son-of-a-bitch through and through.

But to be redeemed, a Bossward has to realize what he's done wrong. It's not enough for Bella to get revenge, Edward has to hate himself.

Now I've given this particular Edward a tumor, so he has the benefit of being able to plead it's not really his fault. Yet I can't seem to put the pieces back together.

Maybe if Bella hadn't overdosed. But she did. It had to be that bad in order for me to appreciate the turnaround.

If she's really given up on herself, though, then it's not like the turnaround is just going to happen.

I suppose that now Edward's all better, he'll buy her flowers and maybe play a song for her on his piano. He'll convince her that life's worth living and he'll encourage her in her art.

She'll get better and they'll live happily ever after, which they have to, since I only read HEAs.

But somehow I don't think any of that's believable.

I'm jarred out of my disappointment over this when work on the track brings the train to an unexpected halt. The train's only delayed a minute, but it's long enough for me to notice that, over in front of the nearby doors of the car, there's a man leaning towards another man and whispering, his lips moving so that I can tell that he's saying "I love you," and even before the words have left the whisperer's lips, the way he's leaning—his posture—makes me think that he's harassing the subject of his gaze, a preppy looking youth in his early twenties whose imperturbable appearance is too perfect to be true (a mask) so that I know that this is a scene of calamity.

But then I wonder if I'm wrong, if the whisperer's advance is in fact welcome and the preppy youth's apparent rejection of the overture a coy game.

The train shudders to a start and when it comes to a stop in the station, the whisperer disembarks only to go down to another entrance in the same car and reenter. But by the time he returns to where I first spied him, the subject of his gaze is gone. Fled. I didn't even see him leave, my eyes on the whisperer.

The whisperer wanders down the car, searching, I think, for the young man.

I lean over to follow the whisperer's progress, to see if he finds his subject, or more shockingly still, _chooses_ a new subject, and as I watch he turns suddenly and catches my eye. I leaned back quickly lest he think me worthy of notice. Lest I become the new subject of his gaze.

I wonder if this is what it would feel like to find myself face-to-face with my Tulpa.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

I'm still checking the paper for the obituary, and my patience is finally rewarded on Sunday. Unfortunately, the obituary doesn't give many details, but I see that there's going to be a funeral.

I spend the rest of the day studying—and I really do study, not fantasizing or staring off into space—that is, until my mother calls.

and just like that

i am undone

broken

it does me no credit to suspect it, but I can't help it

my parents conceived my brother when I was on my way out of the house to keep me chained

they knew i'd never abandon him

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

According to a Gnostic allegory, there was once a Prince.

Content in his youth, the Prince had enjoyed every comfort in the companionship of his kinsmen, and dwelled happily in the kingdom that was his father's. Reaching manhood however, he approached his father and requested his inheritance. Taking this, he passing out beyond the walls of his father's kingdom, crossed the desert and climbed the mountains on the far side, finally forded the waters that divided one land from the next. As he proceeded, he took on the dress of the people he met, so that he would not be shunned by them, adopting their customs and eating their foods, going amongst them like one who was not a stranger. And arriving at last in the westernmost nation of that continent—a fabled land of which he had heard many warnings—the Prince proceeded as he was his custom, adopting the clothes and manner of speech common in that place, eating the local foods and assuming the habits of the citizens, until, at last, he forgot himself completely. Induced to indulge in the vile and base pleasures of his new home, the Prince lost all his possessions and forswore his name. News of his fate soon reached the King, his father, and all of his retainers—those who had nourished the Prince in his youth and loved him best—they all despaired. But sending neither armies nor ransom, the King sent instead a message, sealed by his own hand and ensorcelled, so as to remain concealed from the unclean, a message that traveled in the likeness of a bird, flying out across the desert and over the waters and across the borders of the westernmost nation, finally alighting in the Prince's ear, upon which he was awoken from his dumb stupor, his name and inheritance restored. Revived in this fashion, the Prince returned home, and was from then on content in the company of his retainers and well-pleased to take up again the manners and speech and foods of his own people.

The story (a reinterpretation of the story of the prodigal son) was meant to describe by way of metaphor how it was that the human soul was itself descendedfrom the Godhead (the King) and became trapped in matter (the manners of foreigners), as a result of which a person could forget his own identity and, recognizing only the prison of matter that was part and parcel of the illusive world, mistake it for his true form.

I grew up hating my parents and living in a trailer park. It only made sense that I would fantasize that the world wasn't real.

And maybe J was right, too, and I should just let go. Because maybe I won't care that I'm crazy after I have my psychotic break.

I'll be too high on my so-called enlightenment to care that I'm straightjacketed and shitting myself in an asylum somewhere.

 **AN:**

 **Thank you for reading.**

 **The Carlo Ginzburg book is** _ **Clues, Myths and the Historical Method.**_

 **An excellent introduction to the Jewish-pagan violence in first century Alexandria is provided by Andrew Harker,** _ **Loyalty and Dissidence in Roman Egypt.**_ **Philo's accounts can be found** _ **Legatio ad Gaium**_ **and** _ **In Flaccum**_ **. These have been translated into English by the Loeb Classical Library and they might be floating around the internet. Another account can also be found in the** _ **Antiquities of the Jews**_ **, by the Jewish historian Josephus, which has also been translated into English and might also be floating around the internet. Pagan accounts of this violence, casting the** _ **pagans**_ **as the victims, can be found in H. A. Musurillo,** _ **The Acts of the Pagan Martyrs: Acta Alexandrinorum**_ **. Widely differing views about just what happened can be found in Erich Gruen,** _ **Diaspora: Jews amidst Greeks and Romans**_ **; Peter Schäfer,** _ **Judeophobia: Attitudes toward the Jews in the Ancient World**_ **; and Richard Alston,** _ **The City in Roman Egypt**_ **.**

 **Sources on the violence in Alexandria in the fourth century include the** _ **Papyri London VI**_ **1914 (in Idris Bell,** _ **Jews and Christians in Egypt**_ **,58-71); the anonymous (but often attributed to Athanasius)** _ **Historia acephala**_ **6.8; Athananasius'** _ **History of the Arians**_ **10-13,** _ **Encyclical letter**_ **3-4,** _ **Festal Index**_ **29;** _ **Apology for flight**_ **6-7 (all of the items attributed to Athanasius, including the** _ **Historia acephala**_ **,** can be found online at Christian Classics Ethereal Library **; Socrates Scholasticus' Church History 2.11, 2.14-15, 2.28, 2.45, 3.2 (at archive dot org); Sozomen** _ **Church History**_ **3.6-7, 4.4, 4.10, 4.30, 5.7 (at the end of Socrates Scholasticus'** _ **Church History**_ **at archive dot org); Ammianus Marcellinus 22.11.8-10 (available at several places online – just Google); Epiphanius** _ **Panarion**_ **76.1.1-8 (unfortunately I don't know where to find an English translation; the Greek is in** _ **Opera,**_ **ed. Wilhelm Dindorf and Denis Petau). The secondary sources on this subject mainly summarize the primary sources and argue over who was really responsible. Haas'** _ **Alexandria in Late Antiquity**_ **serves as a fairly good introduction.**

 **The Larry Griffin article is "Causal Interpretation in Historical Sociology."** _ **American Journal of Sociology**_ **98 (1993): 1094-1133.**

 **On police collusion in the lynching of blacks in the USA in the 1800s and early 1900s see Dutton** _ **The Psychology of Genocide, Massacres, and Extreme Violence: Why 'Normal' People Come to Commit Atrocities**_ **.**

 **On the arrival of a police force on the scene inspiring a mob to break out into violence (which is not to say that the police are responsible) see Tamara Madensen and John Eck, "Crowd-Related Crime: An Environmental Criminological Perspective," in** _ **Preventing Crowd Violence**_ **, edited by Tamara Madensen and Johannes Knutsson.**

 **The story of the Prince is taken from the Acts of Thomas, an English translation of which can be found in J. K. Elliott,** _ **The Apocryphal New Testament**_ **(the section that I cited can be found by Googling** _ **Hymn of the Pearl**_ **)** _ **.**_

 **Rec: Someone mentioned that my story reminded them of thimbles'** _ **Figmentum**_ **. That's a really great story, so if you haven't read it already, please do so.**


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephanie Meyers. Plot belongs to me.**

 **Warning: This chapter involves a funeral.** _ **F you 2016.**_

 **Also note: If you read the last chapter immediately after it was posted, I revised it later that night to try and make it more streamlined.**

Ch 6

I try to pay attention. I do. Because it's a funeral and it would be disrespectful to let myself fantasize. Especially about something like this.

 _She was walking out of class when agents Cullen and Whitlock set their sights on her. She was laughing at something one of her friends was saying, a guitar strung over her shoulder and a pile of books on musical theory clasped to her chest._

 _Cullen tapped her on the shoulder and asked if she knew the way to the library. Bella eyed his suit suspiciously, but she stopped. And when Cullen and Whitlock pulled out their badges, Bella told her friends—their eyebrows raised in surprise—that she'd see 'em later._

 _Bella couldn't imagine why the FBI would want to talk to her. But she decided to go along with the act, and almost bought their line about needing her help. Which was how she found herself sitting at a dingy table being interrogated. That's right._ Interrogated _. Like any common criminal._

 _They kept asking her questions. Question after question. But she didn't know any of the answers. Didn't know how they could possibly think that she of all people could be a terrorist._

 _She kept telling them it was a mistake, that they had the wrong person and were just confused._

 _In the back of her mind though, even as she denied every one of their accusations, she couldn't help wondering if in fact_ she _was the one who was confused. Because maybe she took after her mother more than she'd realized._

 _Perhaps she'd somehow gotten mixed up in something, the details of which were escaping her, muddled up as they were in her all too easily muddled mind._

" _Why did James Cannon have photos of you?" Cullen asked, throwing a cache of the pictures in question on the table in front of Bella._

 _She looked down at the pictures, thinking hard. But all she had to offer was another "I don't know."_

 _Cullen didn't believe her. It was obvious to him that she was thinking too hard. It was a dead giveaway that she knew more than she was saying._

 _She_ was _thinking too hard. But it was because she wasn't sure if she could trust herself._

" _How do you know James Cannon?" Whitlock asked, not for the first time._

" _I've never met him." And it was true. At least, Bella didn't_ think _she'd met him._

" _Then how do you explain how he's got sheet music in_ your _handwriting? How he's got underwear with_ your _DNA on it."_

 _She couldn't. That was the problem. Never mind the fact that, unbeknownst to her, the FBI had somehow gotten a hold of her DNA to run against this so-called underwear. Because how could she possibly explain how this creep she'd never heard of had_ her _underwear, sheet music_ she'd _composed, pictures of_ her _?_

 _The interrogation went a while longer without either side making any headway. Then Cullen pulled out another stack of photos and laid them out for Bella's viewing pleasure._

 _Bella covered her mouth, tears that had been waiting to fall now coursing down her cheeks. "What's wrong with you?" she sobbed, closing her eyes to block out the images. "Why would you show these to me?"_

" _Don't you like ARO's work? Thought you'd want to gloat." Cullen sneered down at the crime scene photos, all of them showing mangled corpses from the last bombing that ARO had claimed responsibility for._

" _How could you think that I'd have anything to do with something like_ this _?" Bella knew that there was a very good possibility that she was crazy, but she also knew that there was no way that she would have ever become involved in something so horrible. She couldn't possibly have anything to do with it._

 _But after another hour of questioning, that confidence began to give way to doubt. Her initial shock at the agents' accusations was steadily giving way to a sense of dread._

 _Because what if they were right? What if she'd begun to resemble her mother after all?_

 _A dwindling survival instinct was all that Bella still had going for her. "You can't just hold me," she argued. She knew better than to admit her growing doubts about herself._ You pretend to be sane until they can prove otherwise _. The price of admitting even the slightest misgiving was just too high—her_ sanity _. "I have a right to see a lawyer. You have to charge me or let me go."_

" _Not if you're suspected of terrorism."_

" _This isn't right."_

" _Take it up with the Supreme Court."_

" _The government can't just do this."_

 _Cullen grinned. "Isn't that what ARO is always running around saying?_ The government can't just do this _."_

" _No Eddie," Whitlock corrected. "That was Swan's mother."_

" _Oh, that's right. I forgot. Renee Higginbottom. She was always running around claiming that the government was out to get her, wasn't she? It's right here in your file." Cullen flipped through the dossier sitting in front of him. "Yep. My favorite is the time the police had to cart her off from the supermarket. She was in the dairy aisle, screaming about listening devices planted in the chicken eggs." Cullen glanced up at Bella, feigning sympathy. "That must have been devastating for you. Watching your mother carted off like that. Is that why you joined ARO?"_

" _Fuck off," Bella spat._

 _He smiled. "Ah, there she is. I knew the hellcat was in there somewhere."_

 _But the hellcat wasn't really out to play. It was just that instinct for self-defense, again. Because Bella knew. She_ knew _, didn't she? She'd always been afraid that she was just like her mother._

 _Just like her mother._

 _Later, much later, Cullen sighed. "Ok, say we believe you."_

 _Bella gazed at him dully, her eyes glassy._

 _Cullen tapped the table. "Say we believe that you've never heard of James Cannon. You've never even heard of ARO, except what they say on the news. You just go to college and study music. You're a few cards short of the full deck, maybe, but you're no danger to society. Not like your mother. You sublimate any dangerous tendencies you might have in your music. Wouldn't hurt a fly. But somehow, James Cannon manages to get you in his sights. Maybe when you're playing open mic night at one of those hippy coffee houses where ARO does some of its recruiting. And all of a sudden Cannon's got a big crazy Unabomber hard-on for you. He starts stalking you. He breaks into your apartment and takes your underwear. He steals sheets of music from your composition book. He puts up pictures of you all over his walls. You have no idea any of this is happening. You know you're a little spacey on the best days, so if you notice anything strange, anything out of place, you put it down to your imagination."_

" _You should be flattered by Cannon's attention, really," Whitlock threw in. "I mean, you're the beauty to his beast."_

 _Bella looked sick._

" _So here's the deal," Cullen explained. "We release you. And you use James Cannon's obsession with you to infiltrate ARO. You feed us information on the group."_

" _If you don't," Whitlock warned, "we'll press charges. It won't matter that they don't stick. It's goodbye scholarship, goodbye Boston Symphony. Hell, with your track record, you'll probably end up back in a straightjacket."_

I shake myself out of the fantasy when a small gong at the front of the room is rung.

I feel awfully guilty about fantasizing during a funeral, but technically I'm not fantasizing _during_ the funeral. I'm fantasizing _before_ the funeral, which is just getting started.

I wonder what other people do when they're sitting around with nothing to do. I mean, when they have no choice but to sit quietly and they can't mess with their phones or play a game of Sudoku. I've noticed that they usually end up staring at other people, which is kind of invasive. Rude. They're probably making shit up about the people they're watching, and that's just as bad—if not worse—as fantasizing. At least I don't do that.

I'm trying to pay attention to what's going on in the funeral even though it's been a long day and I'm tired. The service is being held at six o'clock in the evening, which seems late. But I'm grateful that I didn't have to take off from work.

I've only been to one other funeral, and I was pretty young at the time. I don't really remember anything about it.

I'm certainly not prepared for the manipulation. And that's exactly what it is, too—blatant manipulation of my emotions.

The deceased appears to have been a Buddhist—the funeral's being held at a place called The Zen Institute—but all of the guy's relatives must be Christian, because they're glaring at everything and everyone, Bibles clutched tightly to their chests like talismans against the devil (even though everyone "knows" that Jesus got his whole idea for peace-love-and-understanding when he went to India).

Then I realize that these Bible-clutchers are clutching these books for comfort, because they're grieving, and that I'm being an asshole.

So I'm already feeling like crap when the manipulation starts. The guy's relatives are taking turns reading all of these Bible verses, going on and on about God's plan, and I'm damn near tears halfway through, because it's so f'ing said, which doesn't make any sense at all, because I didn't even know the guy.

And by "the guy" I mean the deceased, not God.

I don't know God at all, naturally. You can't know someone who doesn't exist.

Which reminds me that I've been neglecting my Tulpa.

But it's selfish of me to be thinking of my Tulpa at a time like this. It's a fucking funeral for God's sake. _Show some fucking decorum_.

When I go back to concentrating on the service, they're reading another f'ing Psalm and I feel like crying again.

It's enough to make me think that there's something terribly tragic about the inevitability of death—a devastating void left where the living used to be—when really, if I was a good Gnostic, I wouldn't be sad about it at all. Death is just a release from the prison of this world.

Of course, there's a very real possibility that the deceased won't know the passwords to get past the evil archons who're trying to keep us from salvation, meaning he'll probably end up being reincarnated back in the prison that is this plane of existence. But I hope it's working out for him.

Not that it really matters to me if a guy I never met—not in life, at least—finds salvation. It's not as if it's some kind of lesson. I mean, finding his body isn't a lesson in mortality. It would be pretty messed up for me to imagine that the universe saw fit to kill a guy just to remind me to get my head on straight about what really matters in this life.

And that stuff about Gnostics needing passwords in order to get past the archons so that they can reach the Gnostic version of heaven—Nirvana or whatever—is clearly just borrowed from Egyptian funerary cult. It seems to me that the rules of life/death should be simple. Whenever something gets too complicated, it's probably bullshit.

I don't need no stinkin' passwords.

When the Christians have finished reminding us that God cares about all of us (even though all of their examples make it sound suspiciously as if it's the opposite, as if he doesn't, in fact, give a shit about anyone, at least not me), the Buddhists start passing out little slips of paper with the words of this chant that they're about to do. They say that we can chant along if we want, but it's hard to keep up with the lilting melody when they get started, so instead I skim the translation that they've added at the bottom. There's not one word about grief in this chant, which I suppose makes sense if grief really is a chain binding us to existence. (As if all you've got to do to turn off your emotions to find salvation.)

Instead of talking about grief, this chant's all about emptiness. Or form. Or both. There's a lot of contradictions. Something about there being no old age and no death, only for the next line to say that there's no end to old age and death. A mess of paradoxes. It reminds me of _Thunder, the Perfect Mind_ —it's very "I am the first and the last"—which just makes me think that Nietzsche was right about it being a virtue to fuck with peoples' heads, like I'm doing a public service, and a _sacred_ one at that, by being so fucking contrary all of the time, the path to salvation in fact lying in the resolution of contradiction.

But resolution's the wrong word, isn't it? You're not supposed to say that you've solved a Zen koan, are you? You're not supposed to be able to explain what it means. You're just supposed to get it.

Or not get it.

Whatever.

Which makes you wonder how anyone ever knows that they've actually obtained enlightenment.

I've always imagined that enlightenment is heralded by an explosion of light. That you'll know you've made it because you'll see a thousand stars exploding as your entire being is suffused with a feeling of pure ecstasy. I hate that statue of Teresa of Avila where she's being stabbed with all those arrows of God's love—it's pretty garish—but it gets the point across. And I figure that's what Plotinus felt like whenever he was "uniting" with the One.

Maybe everyone's enlightenment looks the same because the truth's universal.

V was never very specific about which strain of Buddhism she identified with, but I don't think she believed in an explosion of light or a semi-sexual union with the One/All/God(s)/Atman Brahman.

She believed in minimalism. Asceticism.

Which would have been just fine, except that she turned it into a crusade against my book collection. She said that I owned too many books. She said they weighed me down.

She owned a single shelf of books. Mostly Ayn Rand.

Can a person who likes Ayn Rand as much as V did really claim to be a Buddhist?

I think not.

 _Why d'you need those books?_ I remember her asking me, in that accusatory tone of hers. Like having a book collection was somehow evidence of a character flaw, proof that there was something missing inside of me and that I was trying to mask the hole with physical possessions.

Fucking bitch.

Because of her, I started trying to get rid of my books, taking them to booksellers and then just giving them away at the library. I remember snatching _The Magician's Nephew_ right out of one bookseller's hands, deciding at the last minute that I couldn't—I just couldn't—sell it. I apologized for my temerity, but he just laughed and said _That's alright. They're your books_. That's right, they were _my_ fucking books, but he already had the rest of the volumes from that set of Lewis and I didn't have the courage to ask him to give them back.

I still feel the burn of that. The loss of the books that I sold or gave away and the shame of the books I that still own, like there's something wrong about loving a book so much that you read it over and over again. I feel the burn of the loss _and_ the shame at the same time, both because of V.

I might be able to replace some of those books, get new copies, yeah, but not the actual copies I used to own, the ones that I read and loved so much. Someone else is running their hands over the pages that I ran my hands over first.

I understand the point of asceticism, I do. But if owning a book means that there's something wrong with me, then so be it. I'd rather be a hoarder than a book-burner any day. It's people like me who are responsible for burying _Thunder, the Perfect Mind_ at Nag Hammadi along with all of those so-called Gnostic gospels. None of the books were on the approved reading list of Athanasius, who was head of Egypt's so-called Orthodox Church, but instead of burning the books (which a good Athanasius-loving Christian would have done) the owners buried them, obviously hoping that they could dig them up again one day, and while that day didn't come for fifteen hundred years, come it did. And these people were ordinary book collectors, not fanatics. The books they buried ranged from a-religious political treatises to hardcore Gnosticism, from paganism to Christianity to Judaism, from one kind of Gnosticism to another. The owners appreciated these books out of a love for reading, out of a love for the kind of free-ranging reflection and paradoxical thinking that is the necessary and sufficient condition for rational and well-reasoned conduct.

Now, imagine that we're struck by an apocalyptic calamity and my apartment becomes the next Nag Hammadi cache. What if my copy of Plato's _Symposium_ is the last copy on earth? Without me, _The Idiot's Guide to Werewolves_ might be lost forever. What if I'm solely responsible for ensuring that future generations can read _Twilight_?

For all we know, my bookshelves could be the lynch pin of civilization.

So who the fuck was V to tell me that I owned too many books?

Imagine what'll happen if we're stuck with V's apartment. We'll have nothing but Ayn Rand to read. (And if Ayn Rand had had her way, people of the socioeconomic class into which I was born would never be taught to read at all.)

To think that an Ayn Rand-loving, book-burner like V accused _me_ of being violent. _You're so volatile,_ she'd say. _How're you ever going to be at one with yourself?_

But if we are each of us different, no two of us alike, then how can we be expected to look the same when we're each of us being at _one_ with our _different_ selves?

Maybe I'm a maenad, twining snakes in my hair and singing paeans to the (imaginary) horned god, but maybe that's who I'm supposed to be.

Which makes me sound crazy, I know, but I still think that what V really wanted was for me to just shut me up and follow orders.

I remember the _one_ time I really snapped. I said "It's not like we're married"—as in I didn't need her fucking permission to do anything. And she _lost_ it. You would have thought that I'd slapped her.

Then that son of a bitch J took her side. He said that I'd crossed a line by mentioning marriage.

 _I_ 'd crossed a line?

No wonder V's husband had left her.

I don't know if that's what really happened, him leaving her I mean. All I know is that she was divorced by the time that I met her.

I can't help assuming that she spent the duration of their marriage trying to stuff him into a straightjacket. Then, because that image isn't horrible enough, I imagine her hacking off his limbs and tying down his branches like he was a fucking bonsai tree. Twisting him into whatever the fuck she wanted him to be.

 _Bitch wouldn't even be able to pass the test from_ Bladerunner _to prove she wasn't a replicant._

The chanting's over and we're being asked to come up one by one to light a stick of incense for the deceased.

When it's my turn, I try to think devout thoughts.

But then it occurs to me that if this world doesn't exist, then this incense isn't doing jack for anyone. In fact, it's kind of a contradiction (and not the kind that brings enlightenment).

Then I feel like a jerk for speculating about this, because maybe I'm wrong and the incense will do a soul some good after all.

Which is why it annoys me so much when I realize that one of the attendees isn't getting up to light the incense.

Sartre would probably say that a person's participation implies belief. And Chaos theory says there'll be ripples. A strict interpretation of Buddhism says a person is obtaining karma by participating and is therefore risking her personal transcendence.

But it's fucking rude the way this guy is sitting out.

The harm he's doing by not participating (like he _wants_ this dead guy's soul to suffer whatever it is you suffer if there isn't enough incense burned at your funeral), seems far more serious than the harm that he'll do to himself by participating (like Jesus—because I assume he's sitting out because he's Christian—like Jesus would put him on a no-fly list just for having the decency to light a fucking piece of incense).

Even the Bible-clutchers are lighting up. If they can do it, why can't he?

And this service is really quite lovely. The whole place is beautiful, with the trim white Japanese lines of the architecture—I'm not clever enough to do more than recognize the country of origin behind the scrollwork and the neat squares—and the beauty of the surrounding garden and woods. The beauty's reward enough, I think, for visitors to burn a fucking piece of incense.

But now I'm full of mean, angry thoughts, and I realize that I've been thinking mean, angry thoughts for quite some time now, letting myself reminisce about V, when I'm supposed to be thinking about the deceased and helping him obtain a state of perfection with my peaceful thoughts.

I wonder if he really is at peace.

Then I'm suddenly irrationally jealous of a dead man. I want some peace, dammit.

Before everything fell apart, V and I were talking about spending the night at this Buddhist monastery in W— V—. The place welcomed overnight guests, and the amenities included guided meditation and enforced silence, which would have been just fine with me because V would have been forced to keep her mouth shut for once. Of course, V was convinced that I wouldn't be able to hack the silence. Not that she admitted as much, but I know that she was just dying to rub my nose in the fact that she was more enlightened than me. But I would have kept my calm, dammit. I would have been the calmest motherfucker on the planet. As long as she wasn't running her fucking mouth at me.

Naturally, our plans to visit that monastery fell apart after what happened on the island.

Not that that has anything to do with my decision right now: I think that I might just start attending the Zen Institute for weekly meditation.

It'll be a nice revenge, I think. Especially if I obtain enlightenment and make it to Atman Brahman/Nirvana/the Pleroma/the One while V's still languishing in the five-fold existence.

By now the funeral's over and people are starting to file out.

Reassured by my newfound resolution to obtain enlightenment, I make my way to the exit.

But I can't help eyeing the tool who wouldn't light the incense—

Only for me to come up short when I recognize the cop.

He's looking right back at me, too, glaring at me like _I_ 'm the one who made an ass out of myself during the service.

He doesn't say a word, just keeps glaring at me until I'm out of sight.

Seeing him has just confirmed my resolve. (Like he has a right to tell me where I can and can't go.) I'm going to start coming to the Zen Institute, if only to piss him off.

And if I happen to obtain enlightenment in the process, so much the better.

 **AN:**

 **Archons – minor deities/angels/stars/ambiguous-hard-to-define-entities that, according to the Gnostics, went to war with the true God (and lost) and try to keep us from obtaining enlightenment.**

 **The chant for the funeral is the Heart Sutra, an English translation of which can be read at ww2 dot Kenyon dot edu slash Depts slash Religion slash Fac slash Adler slash Rein360 slash chant.**

 **The funeral service is based on a Buddhist funeral and a Judeo-Christian memorial service. The person who refused to light the incense at the former is based on a real person, my mother, whose (in)action stemmed not from overt religious sentiment, I think, but rather an inherent boorishness.**

 **That being said, I hope it's clear that the main character in this story is sometimes meant to be boorish herself. Her hostility towards religion (both Christian and non-Christian) is meant to be part of her struggle to figure out what's going on with the world. Remember that she's pissed over what, to her, looks like hypocrisy on her father's part in his espousal of Catholicism while living what she considers a less than ideal life.**

 **Thunder, the Perfect Mind – An English translation can be found James Robinson's** _ **The Nag Hammadi Library**_ **. A sample bit of text: "I am the first and the last. I am the honored one and the scorned one. I am the whore and the holy one…I am the bride and the bridegroom…I am the slave…I am the ruler…I am knowledge and ignorance. I am shame and boldness. I am shameless; I am ashamed. I am strength and I am fear. I am war and peace." There is an argument about whether or not this text is actually Gnostic. Parallels to the phrasing can be found in the** _ **Acts of John**_ **(semi-heretical Christian), the** _ **Ginza Rba**_ **(Persian), and the** _ **Bhagavad-Gita**_ **(Hindu).**

 **Diamond in the rough Rec:** _ **Blind Date from Hell?**_ **by bebe86** Bella is unlucky in love and has been set up on one bad blind date after another by Alice and Rose. She finally agrees to one last blind date with Edward Cullen, but is this going to be the worst blind date yet? Rated M for language and lemons. AH, B/E - Twilight - Rated: M - English - Romance/Humor - Chapters: 34 - Words: 104,173 - Reviews: 756 - Favs: 805 - Follows: 473 - Updated: Feb 20, 2010 - Published: Aug 28, 2009 - Bella, Edward - Complete


	7. Chapter 7

**Apologies for the delay.**

 **Disclaimer: Characters belong to Stephanie Meyer. Plot belongs to me.**

My advisor's supposed to retire in a few years. I would put his obvious disinterest in me down to the fact that he's already given up, but I happen to know that he just _loves_ G, practically laps up every word she says. Because he's always updating me on her progress with her dissertation. He thinks she's a genius.

I try not to hate G. She's nice enough.

I think I fucking hate her.

I'm in my advisor's office right now discussing my reading list. He's going on and on about this stupid fucking book on Mithraism that he made me read. Mithraism was one of the most popular cults in the Roman Empire, but no one alive today knows what it was really about. Oh, we know that the practitioners hung out in caves and they were really into constellations of the stars. But that's it. We don't know what they thought about those constellations or what they did in those caves.

Until now, of course, because my advisor thinks that this book he made me read has got it all figured out. I think it's one step up from _Ancient Aliens._

My mother believes in aliens. She boasts that they've paid her a visit or two (because she's just _that_ important that even the aliens pay court). For this reason alone, I refuse to countenance the possibility that a sentient extraterrestrial has ever visited the earth.

Not that I have anything against conspiracy theories. They're just an expression of the disenfranchisement that man feels living in a capitalist society, _alien_ ated (see what I did there?) as he is from the means of production. I do object, however, to _lazy_ conspiracy theories, and the notion that aliens built the pyramids, et cetera, is not only lazy, it's racist. _People_ built the pyramids. _Egyptian_ people.

Needless to say, I'm a bit put out to discover that my advisor thinks it's alright to explain an obscure Roman cult like Mithraism with New Age astrology as long as the guy doing the explaining has a PhD.

My mother is the same way about Carlos Castaneda. She owns every book that he ever wrote. He had his PhD, too. Unfortunately, he apparently relied a bit too much on his imagination to write his dissertation. It's all about his apprenticeship to a Yaqui sorcerer in Mexico. I've read the book. It's actually a quite enjoyable and informative read. At one point, he says that trying to acquire knowledge is like going to war. That you sometimes have to fight for it. I like that. If only he didn't make it all up.

When people asked Castaneda why no one else could locate the sorcerer he was apprenticed to, he said that he only ever met the guy (who was named Don Juan) on another plane of existence.

Another. Plane. Of existence.

After that Castaneda became a New Age guru and wrote several more books, all of them very popular with baby boomers like my mother. She's warned me not to read any of these books because, apparently, I just haven't got the personal power to be inviting that kind of stuff into my life.

Which just makes me wonder what _she_ 's doing messing about with stuff like that. I mean, what's she doing with all her learning?

I wouldn't mind if it was just Yaqui going about their business, but my mom's one hundred percent Scandinavian, born and raised in the USA, and I'm very much against giving her the launch codes for use in supernatural drone warfare.

But my mother's reading tastes don't surprise me. She isn't scared of anything. One time, we were crossing the street after dark, and this little red sports car came zooming around a corner. There weren't any street lights—because who puts street lights up in a trailer park?—so there was a pretty good chance that by the time the driver saw us it would be too late. I darted to side of the road, even though I knew it wouldn't make a difference (because this sport car was going to hit us no matter what). But what did my mother do? She planted her feet and put her hands on her hips. She wasn't going to move an inch.

The sports car stopped.

That's the kind of mother I have.

So yeah, she reads books about Yaqui sorcerers who may or may not live on alternate planes of existence and do magic that would scare the shit out of a NeoPagan.

Even old school pagans, like the Mithraists, prosecuted witches for the dark things they did. I could give my advisor a whole dissertation on the subject.

Unfortunately, it doesn't appear that my advisor actually gives a fuck what I happen to think about witchcraft or even Mithraism. I doubt that he cares to know what I think about anything.

I just don't get my advisor. I can never tell when he's asking a real question as opposed to a rhetorical question. Because every time he asks what sounds like a genuine question and I try to reply, he just talks over me, answering himself, like I'm not even there.

He must think that I'm an idiot. Not only does he never let me say anything, everything he says is so banal and obvious that he must think I'm a complete and utter ignoramus, so incapable of grasping the simplest concepts that he has to explain them to me. Ad nauseam.

Then out of nowhere, he suddenly takes this discussion to a whole other level. "Oh yes the Gnostics," he says and chuckles.

I don't want to talk about Gnosticism with my advisor. It's alright for us to talk about Christianity and Judaism and Islam and even paganism, because there are still Christians and Jews and Muslims alive today, and there are even NeoPagans. But no one today is a Gnostic. Gnosticism is just crazy talk.

So I don't want to talk about it.

It doesn't bother my advisor to talk about Judaism in antiquity, even though he's Jewish, because he's a "secular Jew." He lectures his undergraduates about how the Bible's all one big allegory and there's no archaeological proof for any of it (which is a slight exaggeration), like there's no room for discussion and you'll fail the class if you don't agree with him.

When the atheist thinks you've gone too far, you've maybe gone too far.

As a grad student who sometimes helps out in these undergrad classes, I've tried suggesting to him that his lectures might leave a bit more room for ambiguity—because some of this is debatable, isn't it?—and he looks at me like I'm speaking another language. "Aren't you worried about one of your students bringing a gun to class?" I've asked. He says "They shouldn't do that."

I'm sure that'll be a consolation to me as I bleed to death.

But maybe the truth is that I'm a poor excuse for an atheist. If I were a good atheist, I wouldn't mind talking about Gnosticism with him.

After all, Gnosticism is probably right up my professor's alley—it's nothing but allegory, all of the complex cosmologies seemingly meant to illustrate a range of obscure philosophical notions—but I don't want to listen to this.

It grates. Like he's exposing all my secrets.

In a way, that makes sense. Gnosticism pretends—or actually was—a mystery religion. Initiates weren't supposed to share the revelations with non-initiates.

That ban doesn't apply to me, though. I'm not an initiate. I should be able to speculate to my heart's content.

But I don't want to.

Because part of me thinks Gnosticism's true.

Or maybe I just _want_ it to be true. I _want_ the Gnostics to be right.

Which means that I actually _hope_ that the world doesn't exist.

How fucked up is that?

But the alternative's just as fucked up: If the world _does_ exist, then either this is all there is (and f that) or there is a heaven, but it's so crappy that people keep doing fucked up things to get out of having to go there.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

It's Saturday, and I'm driving to the Zen Institute for one of the weekly meditations when I pass a dead deer. The place I live has got some of the worst traffic congestion in the country. We're talk sixing lanes all going in one direction and not moving. So dead deer are a pretty common sight. But I'm supposed to be on my way to enlightenment, and seeing a dead deer lying next to the road just seems inauspicious.

Then when I'm getting out of the car, a giant bee scares the crap out of me, dive bombing my face and making these threatening buzzing sounds.

I manage to get away from the bee and tell myself that it's not an omen that I don't belong here. Instead it's an obstacle to be surmounted, like monsters at the gate protecting paradise.

It helps that the grounds of the Zen Institute are just as beautiful today as they were the day of the funeral. Clumps of shrubs and flowers interspersed with white benches and bird baths, all surrounded by a forest.

I was hoping that there would be someone around to tell me what to do. There were signs and lots of people when I got here for the funeral. But there's no one else in sight and no signs, and no proof that the meditation's being held in the same place as the funeral.

I'm starting to feel really anxious, so I decide to sit in the garden until the meeting's scheduled to start. I listen to birds. Look at the leaves.

I think about just staying here, in the garden, and not going inside, because do I really need enlightenment? It suddenly seems like an awful lot of work—figuring out where I'm supposed to go and what I'm supposed to do.

But then I hear voices coming from the direction of the parking lot. And it would be weird if I came all of the way out here just to turn around and go home. I meander—trying to look casual—back to the parking lot and follow a kindly looking fellow inside.

We don't end up in the same room where the funeral was held, which is why I'm glad I didn't just walk inside, and there's a table, which I wasn't expecting.

I've been to Buddhist prayer meetings at people's houses—when my mother was a Buddhist (I don't remember which kind of Buddhist, but I know it wasn't Zen)—and everyone just on the floor. The table makes everything seem so much more daunting. It's very intimidating.

Also, I immediately realize that women must not care as much about enlightenment as men, because I'm the only woman there. (Or maybe women are naturally more likely to be enlightened, and therefore in less need of guidance. Which means that I once again find myself not quite measuring up to the standards of my gender.)

I don't sit next to the guy I followed inside, not wanting him to think that I'm a creeper. But the man sitting next to me is very friendly. He introduces himself, saying that his name is Chad, but that everyone calls him Should-do. I wonder if he's playing a joke on me, but he looks entirely serious. He's Caucasian, as are most of the other people around the table, and I wonder if they think that this name of his sounds as racist as I do, a mash-up of exotic sounding syllables. Then I wonder if I'm the one who's racist for thinking that.

Then he cocks his head to the side and says "You're angry," and I want to punch him. Because what the hell? We just met. He doesn't know me.

The Zen master comes in then. Really, it's just an old man in a robe, but he looks like he's the kind of person who'd be a Zen master (assuming that's what you're supposed to call them) and everyone stands up.

The Zen master sits.

We sit.

"Who are you?" the Zen master asks abruptly, looking at me.

I think about leaving. Or maybe saying that I'm no one. Not because I'm trying to be deep but because I really and truly feel very small right now with everyone looking at me.

I tell him my name.

He looks around the table and announces that he's been thinking about hookers all morning.

There's no way that I heard that correctly.

"We're hooked to the world," he says.

 _Hooked_. Not hookers.

And I realize that I'm an asshole, because it would take an asshole to think that a Zen master would sit around thinking about prostitutes.

But I have to admit that I don't understand much of what he's saying, in large part because his lecture seems to be mostly stream of consciousness. Alas, I seem to be the only one confused. Every time I think that I've got a handle on what's going on, someone asks him a question. And these are deep, penetrating questions, a far cry from the "What on earth are you talking about?" I'd ask if I was brave enough to open my mouth.

I'm proud of myself when I figure out that they're debating the origin of the spirit, not because I've got any special insight into the answer, but just because it's nice to feel like I'm keeping up.

The only recognizably Asian person at the table, besides the Zen master, asks why metal isn't considered an element, as in the earth-water-fire-air system of elements. "Because there're only four elements," is the answer, which sounds like a tautology to me, but I let it go.

I hear the word "hooker" again. And this time, I'm sure that I haven't misheard. Unfortunately, I quickly lose the plot again so I can't tell how it's connected. If we were talking about Gnosticism, the hooker would be the human Soul, divorced from the Godhead and prostituted to matter, trapped on the false plane of existence that is this world, where we're all stuck until we disavow our love of earthly things and return to the Godhead.

It occurs to me that this conversation is difficult to follow because it's intentionally nonsensical. A series of koans.

It would probably defeat the purpose if I just asked if I was supposed to be able to understand what they were saying.

After a while, the conversation comes to a close and we're invited upstairs to meditate.

Fortunately, Should-do explains to me what I'm supposed to do, and I follow him up to the same room where they held the funeral.

The chairs we sat in last week have all been taken away. Instead we get mats, which are a lot less daunting than the table downstairs, especially since these mats are facing long tall windows that look out on the picturesque grounds. Not that I'm supposed to be looking at trees.

I'm not supposed to be daydreaming either, but I can already feel the anxiety building, my heart rate picking up as the pressure in my chest increases, because I should be at home studying, or unpacking the boxes of things that I still haven't put away even after six months of living in this crappy apartment.

I try to take a few measured breaths.

They don't do me any good though.

Everyone else is meditating quietly, getting their peace on, and here I am feeling like all of my molecules are vibrating faster and faster, like I'm going to explode. Any minute, my hands are going to start shaking and strange words are going to start pouring out of my mouth. If I don't get myself under control, I'm going to make a spectacle out of myself and endanger everyone's quests for enlightenment.

It's in everyone's best interests that I just let myself daydream. I'm doing it for them, really.

 _Cullen isn't exactly sure when it was that he first realized that the Bureau had made a mistake with Swan. Maybe it was some time around Swan's third polygraph, when the results showed, yet again, that she was in fact telling the truth about having no ties to James Cannon or the terrorist organization ARO. Maybe it was a reanalysis of the evidence collected from Cannon's apartment in Brooklyn turned up not one shred of proof that Swan actually knew Cannon. He had lots of photos of her, but not one of these pictures looked like they'd been taken up close and personal. They looked like the kind of pictures a stalker would have. He had some of her belongings—a notebook and a pair of underwear—but they were the sort of things that could have been stolen. The evidence suggested less an affair and more an obsession with a woman who didn't even know that Cannon existed._

" _You want me to what?" Swan was clearly confused when they first told her their plan._

" _Get him to talk to you," Cullen explained again in a soothing tone, trying to ease her obvious panic._

" _Why would he talk to me?"_

 _Whitlock snorted. "He's stalking you darling. I don't think him not wanting to talk to you is the problem."_

 _Cullen shook his head. "You just have to put him at his ease."_

" _At his ease?" Swan asked._

" _Talk to him about music."_

 _She looked doubtful._

" _You talk to your friends about music, don't you?"_

" _I talk to other musicians. At school."_

" _You know he's interested."_

 _She didn't look reassured._

 _Cullen knew that they were pushing her—to her limits and maybe beyond—but this case was too big. Over the last two years, ARO had been responsible for ten separate acts of domestic terrorism and the deaths of over seventy people. This was the closest they'd come to finding a way in. So Cullen kept pushing Swan. And Whitlock was always right there next to him, encouraging him._

 _She obviously didn't know what the hell she was doing. Nevertheless, they sent her in, like a fucking lamb to the slaughter._

 _She couldn't wear a wire when she was meeting Cannon, because Cannon was sure to check (and indeed he did, giving Swan some song and dance about dirty cops angry that he made them look bad when they tried to pin a drug charge on him; he was careful not to mention ARO). But there were bugs and cameras in her apartment, and two agents were monitoring her at all times. More often than not, the two agents assigned to watch her were Cullen and Whitlock._

 _So Cullen knew about all of the nights when she couldn't sleep. Most of the time, she'd sit up playing her guitar or a small Casio keyboard. She'd pause to scribble notes in a composition book. Aside from Cannon and one or two other members of ARO—invited at the request of the Bureau, of course, with the hope of getting something on tape—no one ever stopped by._

 _The fact that Swan was something of a recluse was part of the reason that the Bureau was so sure at first that she'd turned domestic terrorist. She fit the profile for ARO's ideal recruit. Young, shy, and passionate about politics—she participated in musical benefits to protest censorship and to bring the troops home. She had no family aside from a mother living in a mental institution. She was cutoff. Adrift. Vulnerable._

 _Perfect for exploitation by ARO._

 _Or the Bureau._

 _And now it's guilt that has Cullen pulling extra shifts to watch her apartment._

 _In fact, Cullen's watching Bella on the monitor this very moment. He knows something must have happened that night when she was out with Cannon, but he doesn't know what it was._

 _He watches her cry until he can't take it anymore._

" _Are you alright?" he whispers into the phone. He's breaking protocol by calling, and he doesn't want to be overheard by Whitlock, who's taking a smoking break on the balcony._

" _Does it matter?" she asks, her voice weak from the crying._

" _Is it Cannon?"_

 _She doesn't answer, but Cullen can hear her muffled breathing as she tries to stem her tears._

" _Did he do something to you?" Cullen asks._

" _Isn't that the point?" she asks._

" _Did he hurt you?"_

" _Would you care?"_

 _Cullen doesn't bother to reply. She hangs up and when she spends the rest of the night in the bathroom, he knows that it's because there aren't any bugs or cameras in there._

 _Cullen's watching again the night that Bella stumbles home. She's clearly high and yet he knows that she doesn't take drugs. Not willingly, at least. She's deathly afraid of a bad interaction with the medication that she's taking for her condition, and is especially terrified of suffering some sort of psychotic episode, of becoming like her mother._

 _He watches as she starts to scribble on the walls. She's singing to herself in nonsense rhymes._

 _He waits until she runs out of space on the walls and starts writing musical notes on her arms._

 _He calls five times, but she won't answer._

" _I think we should go in there," he says._

" _What for?" Whitlock asks._

" _She clearly needs help."_

" _And what are we going to do about it? Strap her to a gurney? We need her on the street. Getting dirt on ARO."_

" _Jesus, look at her. She's losing it."_

" _Bound to happen sooner or later."_

" _Fuck you."_

" _No fuck_ you _. Keep your head in the game, Cullen. This is about stopping ARO."_

" _And if we have to break Swan to do it?"_

" _The ends justify the means. How many times have you said that to me?"_

 _Cullen knows that Whitlock is right. But still—_

" _She can't work for us when she's like this," Cullen says._

 _He goes around the block and climbs the fire escape up to the second floor. (He would be more worried about how unsafe her building is if the Bureau wasn't keeping a watch on her.)_

 _She opens the door, not even bothering to ask who's there, and he quickly pushes his way inside. Her eyes are so dilated that he can hardly see any brown at all._

" _Did you take something?" he asks._

" _No. Not me."_

" _Did someone give you something?"_

" _Oh, yes," she says, then hesitates. A "no" comes out, and is followed right away by a "yes." She laughs, then clamps a hand over her mouth. "I'm sorry," she whispers through her fingers._

" _Did they make you take something?"_

" _They made me; they made me," she replies in a sing-song._

" _What did they give you?"_

" _I don't know."_

 _Cullen looks around, at a loss for what to do. Taking her to the hospital might blow the Op._

" _Do you think it was a love poem?" Swan asks._

" _What?"_

 _She's staring at the composition she's written on the wall. "Pretty Dora. Dorabella." She laughed again. "She has my name, Dora_ bella _."_

" _We have to get you sober," he says._

" _Do you think I'm like my mother?" Swan wants to know then, suddenly changing subjects._

" _No," Cullen lies._

" _She was a great musician. Before she went crazy."_

 _Cullen's phone buzzes, but he ignores it. "Let's get you something to drink," he says, pushing her down onto the sofa and fumbling as she tries to push herself back up. "Stay here," he orders, going into the kitchen._

" _It's a code," he hears her saying as he came back into the room with a water bottle. She's talking on the phone, on_ his _phone. She must have pulled it out of his pocket when he pushed her down onto the sofa._

" _Who're you talking to?" he asks, but she pulls away._

" _No one could ever solve Elgar's_ Dorabella Cipher _, not even Dora," she tells whoever's on the phone._

 _Cullen snatches the phone away from her, and gave her the water instead. Phone to ear, he hears Whitlock asking what she remembers about the code. "What the fuck, Whitlock," Cullen snaps._

A tiny gong ends my daydream. The time for meditation's over and they're chanting now. It makes a pretty lilting noise, the harmonies no doubt a reflection of some underlying synchronicity of the spheres that a mathematically inclined person could express in numbers if he had a chalkboard handy.

Allegedly, Pythagoras was passing a blacksmith's shop one day when he heard hammers striking the metal and recognized the harmonious combinations which are the consonances of an octave. That's just a story, the experiment not being subject to repetition, but the Pythagoreans did invent a stringed instrument with a moveable bridge, proportions marking the musical scale by ratios of 1, 2, 3 and 4.

I wish I understood all of that, but I just don't get it. I mean, I understand that people say that everything is supposed to be based on math. But a sound is a sound. And numbers are numbers. How is a sound a number? Sure, we can assign numbers to decibels, for instance, but aren't the units of measure arbitrarily defined and therefore entirely relative?

If the world is based on math, then that implies that the world is a math problem that can be figured out and solved. I know that's not true.

Besides, the people who say that the world is based on math are the same people who assume that aliens will use base 10. The Egyptians built the pyramids and they didn't even have a concept of zero.

But right now (per Should-do's previous instructions) I'm supposed to be thinking compassionate thoughts, not wondering how we'll communicate with aliens if math isn't the universal language that everyone seems to assume it is or whether Stephanie Meyer is ever going to write the sequel to _The Host_.

Before I have a chance to focus my thinking into compassionate thoughts, the chanting's over and we're all filing outside.

Most people head for the parking lot immediately, not sticking around, but Should-do has sidled up to me.

"Are you Goth?" he asks.

I don't know where this is coming from, but I try to give his question some thought, more than it deserves. For all I know there _could_ be Visigoths in my ancestry, but I know that's not what he means. "I'm shy," I say instead. I notice that that bee from before has come back. Or another bee. Hovering around us.

Should-do tells me that just because a person has to hold himself aloof from the world—for fear of being a hooker—doesn't mean that he has to cut himself off from emotion. He explains: "Sangha is one of the jewels. Dharma's another."

I have no idea what that means.

He clarifies, explaining that we're all waves on the ocean, interconnected. Then he throws an arm around my shoulders.

And I remember why I never go to church. I hate fellowship.

After that, he wants to know again why I'm so angry. "Who hurt you?" he asks, like it's okay for him to talk to a perfect stranger like this.

Ignoring his question, I say "If everything's constructed," by which I mean, if the world's really just a cultural construction, an illusion, "then nothing's real, not even pain." As in _No one hurt me. So leave me alone._

Should-do's not buying it, though. "But why should we hurt each other? If I hurt you then I hurt myself."

I point out that evolution works both ways. Survival of the fittest and selfless altruism both ensuring the continuation of the species. Can't have one without the other.

Should-do undoes the two top buttons of his shirt.

And I can't help thinking that I don't want to be connected to everyone like we're all part of the ocean.

Then Should-do does that which should never be done: He refers to _The Matrix_ , the movie that made everyone think that they knew something about Platonism, as if it's okay to spout platitudes about the artifice that is our day-to-day life.

At the same time, he's scratching at his beard so that these white skin flakes are falling out of it.

 _Middle-path hooker_ , I think.

He asks me if I've ever been in love.

I should walk away, because what the fuck does me being in love have to do with anything, and who the hell does this guy think he is?

But I don't want to be rude.

When I finally do get away—after standing in that parking lot talking to him for over an hour—I spend the entire ride home screaming profanities at the road.

Three weeks later, I get two speeding tickets in the mail for the cameras I blew through that afternoon.

 **AN:**

 **My apologies, again, for the delay, and for not replying to reviews. I will reply ASAP.**

 **Should-do is based on a real person.**

 **The** _ **Dorabella Cipher**_ **is something that the composer Edgar Elgar wrote. The woman it was supposedly about, named Dora, could never decipher it (allegedly).**

 **It's an old story, but it's how I feel right now – Rec:** _Catwoman_ by counselor Life is boring but good. He buys the house across the street. Too many cats spoil his backyard. McCarty tells him they belong to the cat woman. He's a little thrown when he meets her. But he won't back down. And neither will she. Twilight - Rated: M - English - Romance - Chapters: 55 - Words: 142,594 - Reviews: 1095 - Favs: 500 - Follows: 235 - Updated: Feb 24, 2012 - Published: Nov 10, 2011 - Bella, Edward - Complete


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

 _There were no cameras in the bathroom. No cameras and no bugs. It was the last shred of privacy they'd left to her._

 _They'd had already pawed through all of her belongings. And they were still reading every one of her emails. Every post. Every text. Of course, none of that compared to the violation she suffered when they seized her notebooks, when they read through her musical compositions, even the songs that were meant just for her—the unfinished, never going to be heard, broken noted compositions that were intended for only her eyes. They had taken everything from her._

 _And they controlled everything she did. They told her what to do and what to say. Then they watched her to make sure that she did it._

 _She had warned them that she wouldn't be able to pull it off. She wasn't what they thought she was._

 _They didn't care._

 _So she tried._

 _And for some reason it was working. It wouldn't have, except that James Cannon seemed to get off on how out of place she seemed. He liked that she didn't belong, that she so very clearly had no idea what she was doing or what she'd gotten herself into. It made him feel powerful as he steadily asserted more and more control over her, not realizing that she was already under_ their _control, that whatever power he enjoyed was only at their behest._

 _As the days and weeks went by, she thought that she could feel herself physically splintering. She was separating into different versions of herself—the person the Bureau wanted her to be, the person Cannon wanted her to be, and whatever was left over could remain Bella, maybe._

 _Maybe._

 _Because she knew what dividing herself into pieces like this might mean. She had watched the authorities drag off her mother time and time again._

 _It wasn't fair. Bella had been trying so hard to avoid her mother's fate._

 _And she'd been succeeding too. She'd been holding it together, keeping the madness at bay._

 _Until now._

 _But they didn't put any cameras in the bathroom._

 _It wasn't until Cullen saw the water seeping under the door that he knew she was in trouble. By the time he got to her, she was already half-dead, both wrists slit and the water in the bathtub a weak, pinkish wash._

 _This time, they had no choice but to take her to the hospital. Cullen was trying to revive her when the paramedics came through the door, and he insisted on staying with her, riding in the ambulance to the hospital. It was a mistake—Cannon or his crew could have spotted Cullen at any time—but Cullen figured the Op was dead. They couldn't possibly put Swan back in the field like this._

 _He underestimated his employers._

 _Of course he argued with them. He told them that they were crossing a line, because Swan couldn't take anymore. If they put her back on the job, she was likely to say something that would send ARO running for the hills, and every lead the FBI had on them would dry up._

 _It wasn't his call, though._

 _His job, his only job, was making sure that the Op was still viable. That is, unless he wanted to be reassigned. In which case, they'd hand Swan off to another agent._

 _And he couldn't have that._

 _He wanted to tell her himself. He thought he owed her that much. So he went in dressed as a hospital orderly. But when he got there, he didn't know what to do. He played his role, emptying the trash can, not saying a word, because what could he say?_

 _At first, he thought that she didn't recognize him. The way she was laying there in that bed, it almost looked like she was just staring off into space, as if she had no idea where she was or what was going on around her._

" _They want me to go back," she whispered without so much as a flicker of movement. It wasn't a question. She knew._

 _He nodded even though she wasn't looking at him._

" _I've got one condition," she said._

 _He waited._

" _When it's done, all done, you'll let me kill myself. You won't save me again."_

And that's where I lose the plot.

It can't end there, I know. He can't actually let her kill herself.

But I've imagined this scenario over and over again and it comes out the same every time. He _should_ change her mind. He _should_ fix what he's broken. If it were just a _Twilight_ fanfiction, that's what would happen.

If this were the real world, he'd fuck it up, because the ending, the only true ending, means her death. It's what she wants, after all. Keeping her alive would be selfish on Edward's part.

I'm practicing meditation at home now, but it isn't going well. I keep having panic attacks, and have to stop. Or else I start daydreaming—trying to imagine a credible ending that doesn't end with Bella dying—and I don't even realize that I've lost my concentration until the timer on my phone goes off.

I've stopped trying to make a Tulpa. I suppose that's something to feel proud of.

If it's not just murder of a thought-creature.

A _thought_ -crime, but not quite what Aquinas meant by that phrase.

This time, it's a phone call from my brother that interrupts my meditation/daydream. I can hear my parents fighting in the background. Obviously drunk again. "Hey," I say, trying to cheer my brother up. "'Serial sock stealer' is hard to say," I say.

"Can I move in with you?" he asks.

Our parents would never agree to that, but he doesn't want to hear it.

"Fight for me," he says. "Go to court."

With what? I can't afford one of those fancy lawyers who invent pretexts and bribe judges.

"Mom and dad are drunk all of the time."

But they aren't violent. I feel like an asshole point that out, but they aren't.

"There're ways to be violent without using your fists."

And I realize that I'm violent without using my fists.

"Just a few more years," I say, and hate myself for trying to make it sound so easy.

When I hang up, I'm so mad at myself that it just reminds me how Should-do accused me of being so angry. Because I _am_ angry. The kind of angry that is so powerful that it gets redirected back at myself. It occurs to me that Should-do and V really do know me better than I know myself—knowing as they do how angry I am—and that just pisses me off even more.

I want to keep going to the Zen Institute, but if I'm really such an angry person, I'm worried that they'll ask me to stop coming. I could endanger the general quest enlightenment with all of my negative energy.

It's inevitable that I'm going to start thinking about that day on the island. How V told J to go out and have fun, that she was going to stay back in the hotel room with me, like I was a child she was going to discipline.

And J just said "Oh my God," like he couldn't believe what was happening.

The point is, _I_ was the victim. _I_ was the one who was attacked.

So who the hell are Should-do and V to accuse me of wanting to hurt others?

My mother once told me that I shouldn't have friends. She said that I was a bitch, and bitches shouldn't have friends, which is bullshit because whatever temper I have comes out in driblets of bitterness next to my mother's tsunamis of rage.

And I was always doing just whatever V wanted—I never got my way—not to mention the fact that _she_ was the one who resorted to physical violence in the end. So how much of a temper could I really have?

Maybe I'm better off on my own after all.

If I'm on my own, with no one telling me what to do all of the time, then it's not like I can have anyone to be angry at. Besides, being around people just encourages me to generate the karma that chains me to this world.

I remember lying on the floor of J's apartment and V saying "What are you?"

I'd said "Empty."

I hadn't meant it in a bad way. Just that I was _empty_. Not in an "I'm an empty bowlfor other people to use"sort of way, but empty as in I was just myself and nothing else.

V was pissed. Enraged, like maybe I'd taken something from her.

The way she went on and on about it made me think that she was worried that I was making some cry for help. Like I was about to throw myself off of the roof. And instead of it making her want to pull me back from the ledge, it just pissed her off.

J told her to leave me alone.

Now I wonder if she was in fact angry because she wanted to be the one who was empty. _Empty_ , as in free of karma and just herself. At one with herself.

I'm definitely not at one with myself—I certainly haven't obtained enlightenment (and if I have, I'm sorely disappointed)—so maybe V was right.

But I don't like the idea that V might have known me better than I knew myself.

And it's really disconcerting to consider the possibility that other people—even perfect strangers—are able to see something inside of me that I can't see myself.

This anger—this blackness. This _non-_ emptiness.

It occurs to me that if I'm angry, it's probably because I just want to be left alone.

Then it occurs to me that the people who're telling me that I'm angry are the very people most opposed to my isolation. The people who, for some reason, seem to want to know me. Should-do following me out into the parking lot and talking to me for a whole hour. V and J making me have lunch with them every day and go on vacation together.

If I seem angry, it's because I'm trying to get people like that to go away.

They're probably just projecting their own anger onto me—they're mad that I won't let them in—and annoyed at my standoffishness, they accuse me of having defenses, like it's some sort of crime to have boundaries.

Why do they really care? What do they have to gain from me? It can't be just friendship—if I'm such a bitch, why do they want to be my friend?

It's that fucking empty bowl again. It's like they want to feed off of me, as though I really am an empty bowl the way that book on Vedic astrology said, meant to nourish others.

But what if I've got it all wrong? What if I can't be at one with myself because I refuse to be that empty bowl? What if my resistance to my fate is the real reason that I'm unhappy?

Maybe my desire for self-determination is the problem, my need for autonomy a festering sickness.

Does anyone really have the right to be alone? If everyone is really touching everyone else, like waves on an ocean the way Should-do said, soul-on-soul, then maybe trying to keep a part of myself separate (a part of me just for me) isn't an act of self-preservation, but rather an assault on other souls. A violation of _their_ rights.

I refuse to believe that I'm this wrong about things. I can't be.

Nevertheless, I'm really upset by this point, wondering if I'm the one's who's been mistaken all of this time.

I imagine that asshole Should-do picking at the edges of me, trying to worm his way inside, as if he has that right and I've no cause to say otherwise.

I'm so upset that I decide to do the unthinkable. I open up one of the boxes I've yet to unpack—my refusal to actually _move in_ to this apartment after living here for six months being yet another passive aggressive attempt on my part to deny reality—and pull out one of my old journals.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Journal-keeping's a mistake.

Rereading a journal's an even bigger one, proof as it is that you never actually grow, because you realize as you read that the same problems are always dragging you down. Worse yet, you're not even very original in how you go about bitching on a subject.

A person might be forgiven for not growing. We're evolved for cyclical modes of thinking in keeping with the seasons, only chained to linear time-keeping devices for the sake of the modern preoccupation with so-called _change_. It's only in the last couple hundred years that the word "progress" has ceased to be a dirty word, and for some people it still is.

Some quantum physicists say all time is happening at the same time, and that its passage is just an illusion. So we can be forgiven, I think, for needing some sort of cue to help us recollect a particular event in the continuum of sameness. And a journal's just that, isn't it? A reminder of what's happened. It's supposed to represent a linear account, but we're built to live as though nothing ever changes, repeating the same thing over and over again, so we're bound to echo ourselves at some point.

But there's no excuse for being trite.

It's obvious that I'm obsessed with myself and hardly anything profitable can come out of such a one-sided endeavor. Yet, it's all I've got going for me right now—this hope that I'm not wrong about how everything happened. So I read.

This is what I read:

 _The new girl—she's nice in that dismal way all plain women are._

I'm shocked to realize how mean I was, how petty. But I know that I didn't think—don't think—any better of myself. That was the point.

 _She looks young, my age even, but she's in her mid-thirties and divorced. She wears nothing but garish browns and clashing plaids with bowling shoes,_ _and she has these over-large, bug-eyes. Two other girls started at the same time and I won't even try to talk to them, they're too pretty and well-dressed, but I can talk to the divorcee. She doesn't scare me._

The divorcee is V, of course. And the fact that I was afraid of the pretty "girls" but not her shows how stupid I was.

How stupid I still am.

The fact that I refer to grown women as "girls" is no doubt indicative of a pathological tendency towards the infantile, part and parcel of my overall effort to ignore life.

 _They put her in my office at first. Then they moved to the window office that I was supposed to get. I don't mind that she snaked my spot, it was more convenient to move her than me. And I wanted to keep my old room—I have it all to myself—and she has to share her new space. But the girl she's replaced, the girl whose desk she took, was nice to me._

 _I know it must demonstrate a grave weakness on my part, a certain desperateness, how I shake sometimes, with the anxiety of localized traumas. The girl whose desk she took used to make me drink tea to calm my nerves. It was her idea. Before that, there was nothing I could do. I'd just feel sick. The tea made me feel better. I remember one morning, I spilled the water three times before I got the tea steeped and the mug back to my desk._

Until now, I had forgotten all about how V started out in my office. I remember now how I would just greet her at the start of the day, but wouldn't speak to her otherwise, except a "hi" and a "bye" now and then.

I remember the brilliance of her smile the first time we struck up a real conversation.

I had also forgotten how she took the desk that was supposed to be mine.

I later moved into that office with her, to the other desk, even though I didn't want to. When the desk opened up, V said that I should go to my supervisor and ask to be moved. I was grateful that I had a reason to refuse. I said it would be inappropriate—by that point I already had a window, in another office.

Then my supervisor came to me, saying she thought that I'd like to sit with my friend.

I didn't want to. Oh, how I didn't want to. But how could I say no?

I skip a chunk of pages.

— _explaining how it was that I knew where I stood when it came to him. But he said that he didn't understand._

" _You have to pick, you can't be two things at once."_

 _He's a Gemini and so doesn't see things that way at all._

J. The Gemini was J.

He was friends with the man whose desk I took when I finally moved into that window office with V.

J was accustomed to visiting V because he was accustomed to visiting his friend, my desk's former occupant, A. The latter was nothing like me or V. He sang "Happy Birthday Mr. President" in a falsetto during one of the office parties. He printed out a misquotation of Buddha about not trusting anything that anyone says—even if Buddha is the one saying it—unless it agrees with what you know inside to be true. After printed this out (in fancy text that went around in a circle), A glued the quotation to a piece of purple paper, laminated it and gave it to me to hang up next to my computer. He wasn't quiet or dull. But he was nice to me, even when I was quiet and dull and didn't know what to say.

I was especially at a loss for words whenever I would happen to go into A's office and see J sitting there, visiting A.

If it were a silent movie, J would've been the hero. Or the villain. It could've gone either way, with his dimple and his earring and his tattoos and his eyebrows that arched so perfectly.

He was cool.

He exuded cool.

I feel stupid, but I can't put it any more eloquently.

You can see a person and know that people find him attractive without being attracted to him yourself. J was too thin, for instance. And too good looking. I didn't like how good looking he was. Not good looking to me—but to other people, I was sure.

And it just made me want to disappear.

Good looks aside, he was too cool for me to associate with. He got along with A, because they were both cool, but I only associated with A because of work, and J was in a completely different department. There was no reason for me to talk to J, and no reason for J to talk to me.

I was afraid that he'd be mean to me.

Which was why it was so strange that he kept coming around even after A left and I took A's desk.

It was even stranger that V seemed to take his visits as a given. As if made sense that someone like J would want to spend time with the likes of her and me.

And then he was coming by every day, and we were having lunch together, every day, and then it was always the three of us.

J would pencil us into his planner like that, "The 3 for dinner" and "The 3 for drinks."

"Where's fun?" V would say, meaning "Where's J?"

I skip another chunk of pages in the journal and find a passage complaining about J's questions. He was always interrogating me, wanting an update on whatever it was that I might have been doing since we'd last part ways, even if it had only been a couple of hours. He'd want to know every little detail, too. Had I cleaned my desk? Had I taken my car to get gas? It didn't make sense that he'd want to know all of this—but I couldn't complain, because he'd repay the favor, telling me about how he vacuumed and called his mom, like I gave a shit.

Apparently though, I had been trying to come up with explanations for the weirdness, because I come across this bit of bombast:

 _Have decided my aversion to J's questioning stems from uncertainty with regard to the nature of experience—the goal of course being that eternal present of Plotinus and Buddha and St. Teresa of Avila. We are bound by time (reference Augustine's treatise on the subject) but are never_ in _time, that is—we can remember it and we can imagine it, but who can really appreciate an instant of time as it's whizzing by? So, if I'm_ _outside_ _of time, what can I do but recite laundry list summaries of my doings that completely distort the experience?_

What bullshit.

I remember the sick, empty feeling those laundry list summaries would put in my stomach, whenever J would ask for an update on my daily doings—and I couldn't just say 'nothing,' not when he had no qualms about recounting how he'd done laundry and emailed an old friend and purchased yellow sheets and then watched television, as if it was the most scintillating series of events—so I would sit there and tell him every little thing I'd done, no matter how boring, feeling the need to _invent_ something, _anything_ , just to be a trifle less boring.

It made me feel like shit.

But instead of admitting that, I made up some bullshit about his questions distorting the fact that there's no such thing as linear time, as if he was threatening my quest for enlightenment, " _the goal of course being that eternal present of Plotinus and Buddha and St. Teresa of Avila."_

I know that I'm supposed to be meditating with that goal in mind now. But if the world really doesn't exist, then shouldn't the realization of that be my moment of enlightenment?

J was absolutely certain the world existed. I remember one time lying awake all night, hoping J would call and cancel after V backed out of our plans. If nothing else, his cancellation would prove that constant: Relying on other people is a mistake.

But he didn't call. So the next day, J and I went to the zoo. Alone. The two of us.

J and I never went anywhere without V. While V and I would often spend time together without J, V rarely did anything with J without me and I never did anything with J without her.

That day at the zoo, J and I saw pandas, a rhino (playing with a tire), and prairie dogs (I remember because I've found the entry in my journal).

Then we went to a coffeehouse and played cards.

For some reason, he tried to stand on his head on the sidewalk, to show off I guess, and fell down.

I couldn't help wondering if he would later ask me to recite everything I'd done that day with him, just to make sure that our memories matched up, as if divergences might reveal the inner workings of our psyches.

When I got home, I apparently read Japanese poetry until I fell asleep (I'd written that down, along with everything else).

A week later, it was my birthday. I remember feeling a little lost that day. I remember thinking that all I wanted was "All different, all the time." I that already had though, didn't I? With V and J? Constant change? Happiness.

But I felt lost nevertheless, thinking (maybe also feeling) that I ought to be sad for some reason.

V and J were adamant about taking me out to lunch that day. They made me miss the birthday party that the office threw on my behalf. My old officemate, L (the one I left so that I could share an office with V) had spent over an hour looking for the cake recipe she made for me. I wish now that I'd gone to the party, that I'd told V and J that we could have lunch some other time.

I remember this one Saturday when J drove us into the country. We got out at a park and V made us stand on a log and hold hands because she thought that J was blue and that I was bored, which he was, and which I wasn't. I said that I preferred to go on walks in the woods by myself. Then I wandered away to stand by the water, watching the rapids. An old man bird-watching a few feet away tried to point out two eagles to me. I remember pitying the birdwatcher, for being alone like that, and I remember thinking that he probably thought that I was alone too, and that he was thinking of offering me the use of his field glasses, because I couldn't for the life of me see the birds that he was trying to point out, but then V came, and even though I should have been grateful for the escape from the bird-watcher, I felt miserable instead. V made me go sit with her and J, and J told us how he wished that he could paint the landscape around us, and he told us just how he'd paint it, how he'd make it look so desolate. His description made me like the scene even more. J skipped stones and V mocked the signboards that had been put up to describe the wildlife.

On the way back, we saw eight dead deer and discovered that J was a deer-killer. He had hit three deer with his car over the years. He didn't hit any that day, though.

When April Fool's Day came, V wanted to trick J. It was her idea, but of course, she was no more imaginative than a block of wood, so I came up with the actual plan. It was still _her_ idea, but for some reason, I was the one who had to stay late at work that night in order to take J's picture. I was the one who developed the film (from a disposable camera) and I gave it to V so that she could cut his picture out for the card. Together, we cut letters out from the newspaper and pasted them into a love letter. I made the mix-tape (yes, a real tape, not a CD). And I was the one who left it all on his chair at work. It wasn't very original, but I thought it was funny.

It became a trifle less funny when J came right to me, as if there was no doubt that if someone was stalking him, that it would be me. He declared that he was keeping the evidence for the police.

He was just joking of course.

Then V said the whole thing was further evidence of my obsession with J, which didn't make any sense at all, since pretending that he had a stalker was her idea.

She didn't sound like she was joking either.

The real difference between me and them, I think, is that I never said what I really thought. The two of them being pysch majors, they thought it was alright to go around diagnosing everyone. And I guess they thought that other people were too stupid to see what they saw. The truth it, other people were just too nice, had too much class, to open their mouths.

This is what I saw and didn't say: V was the one who was obsessed with J. She used me to get to him. She was lying about being sick that day we were supposed to go to the zoo, for instance. She wanted me and J to be alone to see if something would happen. And she was the one who wanted to stalk J, but she used me to do it.

This is what she just never understood: She was the one I really cared about, not him.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

The Zen master is talking about the futility of futility this time.

I don't even try to understand.

Afterwards, during the meditation, I only last a few minutes before I start daydreaming.

I'm imagining there's this bank robbery, and they take Bella hostage so that they can get away. The police think that Bella's in on it. (But it's not that movie, _The Town_ , because Edward's a cop, not a criminal.) James is one of the thieves, and he's obsessed with Bella. He starts stalking her, but Edward and the rest of the cops still think she was in on it. They don't believe her.

The bell rings signaling the end of meditation before things can get really bad for Bella.

And I realize that I've spent almost the entire time daydreaming. Again.

Afterwards, Should-do wants to talk again, but I tell him that I have to go.

"Oh, what are you doing?"

 _What am I doing?_ Who the fuck is this guy?

Just like J with his goddamn questions.

"Burning some books," I snap, meaning my journals, because I'm thinking of burning them, and it doesn't occur to me how I sound until Should-do is looking at me strangely. "It's a cleansing," I clarify.

"Well I'll see you next week," Should-do says.

I nod grimly, thinking about what that means. Another week of this _._ Coming all of the way out here and not understanding a word the Zen master says. Doing my best not to daydream when my heart beating so fast that I want to scream, so I end up letting my daydream after all.

The attainment of enlightenment is hard, I realize.

It's awfully hard.

I'm almost make it to the highway before I realize that I've left my purse in the meditation room.

I do an illegal u-turn and see a camera flash. So then I'm cursing at myself, until it occurs to me that it's cursing like this that made V say that I had a temper.

But scientists have done studies. Cursing is healthy. It allows a person to release her frustrations.

Of course Should-do would probably say that let myself become frustrated in the first place.

Like frustration's a choice.

The parking lot is empty and no one seems to be around.

I jog inside the main building and up to the meditation room, still annoyed at myself for being so absentminded.

Fortunately, I find my purse lying in the corner just where I left it.

Except that now it's under another dead body.

And I just know that that cop is going to be pissed at me about this, too.

 **AN:**

 **Obviously, I never found a dead body at the place that the Zen Institute is based on. And I didn't start going there because of a dead body, either.**

 **Rec:** _ **Unfinished**_ **by remedy25**


	9. Chapter 9

**Posting early.**

 **Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

I'm right. The detective is _very_ angry with me.

Fortunately, I'm still not at one with myself, so I'm prone to frustration, which inspires illegal driving maneuvers which set off traffic cameras, so I happen to know that there's a picture of me about to get on the highway several miles away from the Zen Institute, which corroborates my story about turning around when I realized that I'd forgotten my purse

The police are fairly confident about the time of the murder, thanks to some new-fangled pulse monitor the victim was wearing that tells the police exactly when his stopped. Fortunately, I was well away from the Institute at the time.

What's more, I don't recognize the victim. He never came to any of the meetings I attended.

Nevertheless, the detective makes an effort to impress upon me the fact that my presence at the Zen Institute might be interpreted as an unwelcome intrusion upon the investigation.

I, in return, suggest the possibility that my religious freedoms are being curtailed.

"You should start taking this seriously," the detective advises.

"I am." I ignore the fact that I'm batting away a bee as we have this conversation. We're standing in a garden, with crime scene investigators scurrying in and out of the building behind us.

"Don't you think it's strange that you happen to stumble across two bodies?"

 _Someone had to find them. Why not me?_ But that sounds flippant, so I don't say it.

He continues. "How many women are there at the Zen Institute?"

"How should I know?" I'm the only one I've seen so far.

"The killer chose _your_ purse. You're being targeted."

"Which is it? Either I'm setting myself up as a target or I'm inserting myself into the investigation. I can't be doing both."

"You're doing both."

I know that he's right. I don't have any business coming out here every week. I don't really need enlightenment, at least not now. I already have enough going on in my life with work and school and my family.

I'm better off on my own anyhow. I shouldn't have started coming to the Zen Institute.

Scratch that. I shouldn't have gone to that happy hour four weeks ago. If I had just gone home straight after work, I wouldn't have found that dead body.

Unless everything really is connected. For all I know, my ordering a cider at the bar meant that the waitress was late getting someone else's drink, which made that someone decide to leave early, which meant that he got a taxi that was meant for some other someone who was trying to get home to her kid, which meant that the babysitter had to stay late, which meant that the babysitter missed her train, which meant that she wasn't there to stop her friend from walking down an alley to his death. Maybe it really is all my fault.

I tell the detective that I haven't got anything more to say. He isn't happy about it, but he lets me go home.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

That night, I dream of my Tulpa.

At least I think it's my Tulpa.

I'm outside, in the dark and alone, the lights of a house behind me and nothing but gloom ahead.

I feel something clutching at me, tugging me forward. So I stare into the darkness, trying to make out a form. But there isn't anything there. I reach towards the gloom, only to recoil when the tips of my fingers begin to disappear.

 _If I walked into it_ , I dream-think, _I'd never come back_.

I dream-think about doing it, about disappearing and never coming back.

But I'm too much of a coward for that.

I wake up just as I dream-decide to turn away from the darkness.

My first thought is that the dream is my Tulpa's way of telling me that he's angry that I've stopped trying to think him into existence.

But that assumes that he actually has some substance—that there is a _something_ to be angry with me.

I'm sure that it's just my subconscious. I must be feeling guilty for killing my Tulpa, even though I didn't really kill him, I just stopped trying to make him real.

Or maybe I'm just losing my mind.

But I almost never remember my dreams, so the fact that I've remembered this dream seems significant.

Most of the dreams I do manage to remember are about being asleep—that's right, I _dream_ about _sleeping_ —I'm asleep and I can't wake up. I dream that I'm lying in my bed not moving. I'm straining every muscle in my body, but it's no good. My heart's racing and I'm fighting and fighting and fighting and fighting…

Sometimes I wake up from one of these dreams and I'm so goddamned grateful that I managed to break free. Only to realize that I'm actually still asleep.

One time, I woke up from one of these dreams and I was feeling so anxious—so shaken up by the dream—that I left my bedroom and went out into the living room, where I found my mother sitting on the couch. I sat down next to her to tell her about my dream. And as I sat there talking to her, I realized that I was still asleep in bed, unable to wake up.

One time, I dreamt that I was watching a bird in a cage. When I was growing up, the magpies living in the trailer park were always pushing baby birds out of their nests. We would take the birds in, and give them names like Om and Nirvana. I had to do most of the work, using tweezers to feed them worms, and the cages were always kept in my room, so that the birds would keep me up all night with their crying. And they'd always die, no matter what I did.

I remember dreaming that I was watching a bird in a cage, and this bird was crying, just like the baby birds would cry, all of the time. It was croaking and dying while I watched it. And then I thought _That bird is me_ and all of a sudden I was inside of the cage looking out at the bars gasping for air.

Then there are the dreams that I think that I _remember_. I mean, the dreams that I seem to be dreaming over and over again. And I'm not talking about dreams that mimic my waking life. I'm not worried about the dreams where I go around repeating the things that I've done in real life. I'm worried about the dreams about places I've never really been: The one where I'm walking a dog around this park with manicured green lawns, or driving around a marshland, or wandering around this inland bay, each of the places familiar to me by now because I've seen them so many times in my dreams.

Like they're real.

My mother would say that I'm probably just dreaming about my past lives.

Needless to say that my mother knows more about my past lives than I do. For instance, she says that I died of mustard gas when I was a soldier. She says that dad was there too. He was stationed in my unit, and when the mustard gas exploded, he just left me to die.

I have no problem buying that my father would've left me—he's a coward—but I refuse to believe that I'd make the mistake of putting myself in his hands again. I resent the notion that we're destined to be reborn with the same people over and over again until we've settled whatever debts are owed. Besides, in what universe could my parents be karmically destined to be parents, let alone _my_ parents?

My mother says she and I were sisters in a past life, but she's yet to give me any details about what we could have possibly done to each other to justify us being reborn as mother and daughter.

I bet that bitch fed me my bird.

But I say, _Consider the score settled_. Because once this life is through, I never want to see either of my parents again.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I'm supposed to be doing data entry, but it's not very intellectually engaging, so I find myself thinking again about my dream from last night. The one about my Tulpa.

It's nonsense, I know.

And yet, I can't help thinking that it's a sign.

If I had a Tulpa, it would be completely devoted to me. It would be there for me whenever I needed it. It would be loyal, too, always taking my side.

"What're you doing?"

I jump in surprise at the voice. But it's just D—not a Tulpa—and she's grinning at me like she's in on some secret.

"Nothing," I say.

"Right," she laughs.

"Why?" I don't like the look on her face. "What does it look like I'm doing?" I start worrying that it's started going around the office that I'm sitting at my desk daydreaming when I should be working.

"You're thinking about a guy," she replies. "I can tell."

"A guy?"

"You know. A _guy_. You dating anyone?"

"No."

She laughs again, like she thinks I'm lying, but she gives it a rest with the questions.

I wait until she goes away to check myself in a mirror. My cheeks are indeed flushed. My eyes are dancing.

I look excited. _Alive_.

 _Is this what it looks like when a person is in love?_

If so, then I'm sure it's more proof that there's something wrong with me. Because I was thinking about my Tulpa when she walked up.

 _My God, I'm a monster_.

I remember that time J asked me to define love (he was asking, I later realized, because he was thinking about breaking up with his girlfriend). When I was done babbling about Plato's _Symposium_ , he said "Love is sacrificing yourself for other people."

But everyone I sacrifice myself for, I hate.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I go home and start unpacking the rest of my boxes. I've put it off long enough.

While I'm unpacking, I find something I wrote on a scrap of notepaper and tucked inside of a book:

 _December 15 – Was reading a book that I wanted to fall into, but I had to spend all day helping my brother with a project and then had a fight with my mother, so I didn't want to sleep, just sat in bed all night watching tv, mindless. Wanting to dull myself._

"Dull" myself? What the hell did that mean?

 _Called in sick the next morning and went back to reading that book—really too long after all—_

The book that I found the note inside of? It was seventeenth century prose and, indeed, rather too long.

 _Then went sledding with my brother, walking to the college and going down the hill behind the retirement community. Spooked myself a little, going down into the reeds and thorn bushes, under which I discovered a sort of bog, buried in the snow. There were little channels going through the snow where the water was still running in the stream and where small things were probably hiding. The snow was dripping from the trees, splashing and plopping, so that I kept spinning around to see if anyone was there. But there was only my brother, playing in the snow._

I'm thinking about asking my parents if they'll let me take my brother for a while. "Give you guys a rest," I'll say. They might even agree.

But then they'll probably get drunk one night and call the cops to accuse me of kidnapping.

I can't stand being in my apartment any longer— _fuck unpacking_ —so I drive to a coffee shop.

On the way inside, a man on the street shouts at me. "Was it you?" he yells.

I don't know what he means, but I nod, because I'm just trying to get rid of him.

So he falls into step beside me and mutters something.

"What?" I ask, pulling away.

And he repeats his accusation.

"It wasn't me," I declare, outraged, because how dare anyone accuse me of that?

He apologizes and goes, but I'm—

I'm left there on the sidewalk feeling traumatized.

It's the fact that I just nodded—that I just _agreed_ with him that gets to me.

I go inside the coffee shop, trying to forget about what happened, but it's so crowded, so noisy. When I go to stand in line, I nearly cutoff a woman who was there before me. "It's the weather," she says. "So hot and humid. Everyone's out of sorts." She tells me that she has a headache, and she looks askance as a child behind us shrieks for a piece of candy.

She sits behind me after we got our drinks, but I will not look. I'm in the ebb and flow of everything, here at this table that I was lucky to get. I've pulled out my notes so that I could study—so that I could look like I was studying—arranging the notes just so, lest someone think me idle, like it's a crime to be sitting alone at a coffee shop with nothing to do, a neon sign that I want someone to talk to me.

I could turn around and talk to woman from the line, ask her if she likes her coffee, but I won't. I'll sit here alone, and I won't talk to anyone.

Because that's easier than trying to accommodate myself to someone else's idiosyncrasies. Easier than the heartache when they take your heart and stomp on it.

I should've just stayed in my apartment—but I didn't want to be alone. Or rather, I wanted to be alone surrounded by other people.

I manage to finish my drink before the noise becomes too much and I have to leave. I wish now that I _had_ stayed at home.

But I don't even make it all of the way to the door of my apartment before I notice that something is wrong. The door's not closed all of the way, and I can hear noise inside.

When I nudge the door open and see what's inside, I want to scream.

 _This is it_ , I realize. _I've really lost my fucking mind._

Because when Dana Andrews is sitting in my living room, reading my journals.

I wonder if I'm daydreaming, but why would I daydream about this?

It's real. Dreadfully, awfully real.

And this isn't Dana Andrews and I'm not Gene Tierney.

It's that detective. The who's been accusing me of butting into his case.

And it's _my_ journals he's reading. Things that I never meant anyone but me to see.

"What're you doing?" I'm asking, the words coming out in gasps because my throat's closing up.

I think about snatching the journals out of his hands.

But that won't do anything about the fact that he's already read them.

"Your mother let me in," he says, like it's nothing. Like he isn't doing anything wrong

My _mother_?

My mother.

My mother my mother my mother my mother my mother my mother—

He glances over his shoulder. "She's passed out in the bedroom." And I can hear a tv blaring from there.

"You can't read those," I say, as if I can make him un-know what he already knows.

"They were in plain sight."

 _No! No! No!_ This is all wrong. "I'm not a suspect," I remind him.

"You can't have it both ways," he says, mimicking my words from the last time we saw each other. "Either you're involved or you aren't."

"I'm not involved."

"You found both bodies."

"It's a coincidence," I say. Never mind that coincidence—synchronicity—is the beginning of religion, or so Jung argued, the occurrence of what looks like patterns suggesting as they do the existence of an underlying order, God's plan.

"And I'm supposed to believe that you just up and decided to join this cult?" the cop quips.

"It's not a cult and I have every right to join."

"Why?"

"Why?" I'm confused.

"Why are you suddenly hanging out there?"

Because I want to find enlightenment. But I feel stupid saying that. Even stupider admitting that it's only because I want revenge on an old friend.

I don't say anything, hoping he'll let it go.

But he isn't done with me. A mocking tone laces his words as he continues. "I can understand why you'd be interested in the case." He holds up one of the journals. "You're a lonely, bored woman."

I can feel all of the energy draining out of me.

And he just keeps going. "You think it's romantic. But it isn't. It's dangerous. You need to grow up and get a life."

He warns me to stay out of the investigation. Warns me again, I mean.

I promise not to go back to the Zen Institute. And he leaves.

My mother eventually wakes up. I her drive to an ATM, give her all of the money that it'll let me take out at one time, and take her home.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The next day, I meet with my advisor. He spends the first ten minutes of our meeting answering his personal email, and the next fifteen talking about his sailboat. When he finally condescends to glance at the latest updates to my reading list, he sighs.

He can't make any recommendations about books I should be reading, or so it seems, because he doesn't have any comments and I'm too nervous to ask.

He tells me to keep "plugging away at it."

I go back to work and find out that they want me to train the new research assistant.

She's thin and pretty and at lunch she told everyone in the break room that she originally trained as a dancer. She even auditioned for a ballet company in New York.

I give her a list of instructions to read (Standard Operating Procedures, they're called, all official-like, as if we work for NASA) and then sit at my desk, wondering when IT will get around to flagging me for reading fanfiction on the job.

Comps are in a week, so if I'm not going to do any work, then I know that I should study, but I can't bring myself to pull out my notes.

I check on the new girl and see a copy of Ayn Rand's _The Fountainhead_ in her bag.

V made me and J read Rand's _Atlas Shrugged_ , and we drove out to see Falling Waters, because the architect and Rand apparently had hard-ons for each other. It was an awfully tiny house.

I decide to dislike the new girl on principle.

So maybe it's retribution for my irrational dislike of someone who's practically a stranger when my car won't start up when I'm at the grocery store that night.

It doesn't make any sense, I know—the notion that my feelings towards a person might have any effect on the mechanical workings of a car—but who said that the world has to make sense?

So I decide to be nice to the new girl at work the next day, even though I have to take the bus to work from the repair shop, and taking the bus always puts me in a bad mood.

I'm sitting on the bus, staring out of the window at the sun, when the light begins to flicker strangely against the glass.

I sit up, trying to figure out what I'm looking at.

The sun's flickering again, the shiny metallic disc glinting in the sky, bits of it blinking on and off. And then all of it goes off, only to flash back on a second later.

I would think it was just the trees, that the light's just flickering through the trees—smaller bits of sunlight, blinking on and off, have the outlines of foliage and branches—but I can see the trees through the glass, and the sun's well above the tree line.

It takes a full minute for me to realize I'm looking at a reflection. The sun's actually on the other side of the bus, shining through the window on the other side, and it's the reflection of that that I'm looking at.

But it seems so real.

And upon comparing the actual sun, glowing through the glass, and its reflection, I find that I like the reflection far better.

I wonder what's wrong with me that I would prefer an imitation to the real thing.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I know that I shouldn't do it.

I know that it's in my best interests that I stop daydreaming altogether. And I try. I really do.

I fail.

I picture my Tulpa as a young man. He can see him living in an apartment and going to school, like me.

That's as far as I go, and even that much seems dangerous. Like I'm unleashing something wild and unpredictable on the world.

But if I've already gone this far, then what's stopping me from going even farther?

That Saturday, I pick up my car at the repair shop and drive out to the Zen Institute, even though I promised the detective that I wouldn't go back.

I can't help remembering that scene in _Laura_ when Gene Tierney breaks her promise to Dana Andrews. "I have never and never will be bound by a vow that I don't make of my own free will," she says. Or something like that.

And I don't think that I acting of my own free will when I promised the detective not to return to the Zen Institute. I was under duress. He might not have threatened me—not in so many words—but police are the jackboot of The Man. Specters of violence and oppression. Everyone knows that.

Even if I weren't annoyed with the detective for extracting that promise from me, I don't feel entirely like myself.

I'm tired. Like I'm walking around in a daze and someone else is calling the shots.

When I pull up to the Zen Institute, I find Should-do standing by the entrance.

"The meeting's cancelled," he says.

"Cancelled?"

"You heard about the murder?" he asks.

I nod, surprised that he doesn't know that I was the one who found the body in the meditation room. I would've thought that bit of gossip would have travelled alongside news of the murder.

"We shouldn't be alone at a time like this," Should-do declares. "We need to pull together. Everything's connected."

"I'm sure the police will catch the killer soon," I say, not because I have confidence in the police but because I feel like Should-do is freaking out.

"You think so?"

"Sure."

He runs a hand over his face. "Do you think that we should chant for him?"

I'm confused. "Chant for the victims?"

"For the murderer."

Now I'm really confused. "You want to chant for the police so that they catch him?"

"No. For him. For his soul. When he's captured, maybe we can petition the police for his release."

"You don't want him to go to jail?"

"He needs compassion."

Should-do is either kinder or crueler than I could ever hope to be.

He invites me back to his place so that we can meditate. He says that he has this special room set aside where we'll be comfortable.

But this is well outside my comfort-zone. I don't want to know him that well, even if we are connected.

Not that I want to go home either. There's nothing for me to do there but study, and I'm so anxious over Comps—

Fortunately, my cell phone rings just then. It's my brother.

I give Should-do my regrets and tell my brother that I'll pick him up in a few minutes.

The Zen Institute is only a few miles from the trailer park, and for once I do the speed limit. By now, I know that at least one speed camera is sitting there. I know that a ticket is probably coming my way.

But if not for the speed camera—if not for my penchant for breaking traffic laws—then I'd be on the hook for murder. You never know when you'll need a picture of yourself as an alibi.

So I press on the gas and feel the car surge forward.

I sometimes get the temptation to just drive and drive and drive.

If I didn't have to pick up my brother right now, I'd do it, too. I'd go. I'd drive off and never come back. Disappear. Wind up in a diner somewhere where everything's still in Technicolor. I'd get a job as a waitress working behind the counter. I'd keep wearing my glasses, and I'd pour sodas for little boys. I'd be the extra in that film where Lana Turner's trying to figure out how to keep the postman from coming back.

It occurs to me that my brother wouldn't mind taking off with me. He'd welcome the change. I could pick him up and the two of us could run away together.

What's the point, really, of sticking around? Of making promises to cops that I won't keep? Of trying to act like a grown up?

People think the worst of me no matter what I do. They take one look at me and decide that I'm angry, a murderer, a liar, a child.

So why not just do whatever I want, whenever I want?

After all, if the world doesn't exist, then there's no such thing as "doing the wrong thing," is there?

Supposedly, there was an argument in Gnostic circles about what people are supposed to do about the fact that the world isn't real. On one side, you had the Gnostics who thought that the way to salvation lay not in shunning the world, but in embracing it, because why not? If the path to enlightenment lays in contradiction, then it makes sense that people would think that it might be worth embracing the illusion, the very thing they were trying to escape. They were the most devout sinners, committing every kind of crime, reasoning that degradation and corruption had a salvific merit. On the other side of the debate sat the ascetics. Believing that salvation lay in denying the illusion, they tried to cut all of the links binding them to the lie.

Sometimes I wonder if the criminals were the ones who got it right. I wonder if they ended up getting their enlightenment in the end, except that no one could tell, because from the outside they looked crazy.

If that's what it takes, I'll never be enlightened. I'm no killer. And I don't want to be crazy.

 **AN:**

Rec: An old favorite of mine - I _n the Days of Auld Lang Syne: Fix You_ by Feisty Y. Beden Reeling from traumatic events in high school, Alice hid away a part of her soul. Can Jasper help her find it again, when she didn't know she was looking? Story is rated M for language. A/J, AH, OOC. Part of larger series *In the Days of Auld Lang Syne* Twilight - Rated: M - English - Angst - Chapters: 28 - Words: 110,346 - Reviews: 651 - Favs: 218 - Follows: 116 - Updated: May 14, 2010 - Published: Feb 24, 2009 - Alice, Jasper - Complete


	10. Chapter 10

**Sorry for the delay. RL. I will reply to reviews ASAP.**

 **Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

I have Comps this week.

Fucking finally.

I've taken the entire week off from work. And I do nothing but study and study and study. Then panic and panic and panic.

When I'm so tired from studying and panicking that I pass out, I dream confused snatches of Latin.

 _Haec certe deserta loca et taciturna querenti_.

 _Haec certe deserta loca et taciturna querenti_.

 _Haec certe deserta loca et taciturna querenti_.

I wake up and start pulling the books from my shelves, trying to find the book this line is from—assuming that it _is_ from something, and not just scrambled nonsense—and I've pulled down half of a bookcase before it occurs to me that I might be able to find it more quickly on my phone.

It's Propertius. One of his raving, half-mad poems to Cynthia, where he's begging her to come back to him: "Here is a silent, lonely region for grieving."

And in my sleep-deprived state I imagine that it's a message from my Tulpa again, that it's his way of saying that he wants me back.

 _But he never had me_ , I think.

Coming to my senses, I chastise myself for indulging such bullshit, even half-asleep.

The day before the exam, I go to see my advisor one last time. I'm hoping that he'll give me last minute advice.

I try to surreptitiously ask him to clarify his position on the "consumer city" model and "defense-in-depth," because I'm at my weakest on economics and military history.

Instead, he wants to know how this one book on the East managed to make its way on my list.

I tell him that I added it.

He grunts.

I don't know what that means. Like is the guy who wrote this book secretly a joke in the field? My advisor likes books that make up shit about stars, so how can he possibly have anything bad to say about the book I added? My advisor's really fickle, though. He likes to gossip about who's drinking too much and who's standoffish at conferences. He has a long-standing grudge against this one guy for criticizing one of his books. And he tells you all of the same long-winded stories over and over again.

The fact is that I had to add the book to my reading list because my fucking advisor wouldn't give me any fucking advice and I had to turn in the final list and I was worried that it wasn't long enough. If my advisor would have just done his fucking job then we wouldn't be in this situation.

He doesn't say anything else about the book I added, but he blows off my questions about the "consumer city" model and "defense-in-depth."

The written exam is a disaster. Two days of sheer hell.

The options for the questions the first day are boring. So I write about conversion instead. By the time that I realize that I'm fucking myself over by not addressing the actual question they've asked, I've run out of time to fix it.

I don't sleep at all that night.

The next day, I'm careful not to make the same mistake, but I'm not sure that I've done enough to recover.

That night, I have to take cold medicine in order to sleep.

I decide to go into work the following day, even though I've requested leave, because if I stay home, I'll go crazy.

But there's a rainstorm, and the power goes out at eleven. They send us all home.

The power's out here as well. I don't want to sit in the dark in my apartment. I can't really afford to live in the kind of apartment that continues to seem nice and inviting when the power goes out. I can hear the neighbors on one side arguing and the ones on the other—well, they're not _arguing_ , but they're not being very quiet either. I could run a white noise app on my phone, but the battery's dying and with no AC the apartment's getting hotter and I just heard a police siren, which just sets my teeth on edge, because who wants to live somewhere that has the police always showing up?

V helped me pick this apartment out, back before everything went down on the island. V and J had been pressuring me to move away from my parents for months. They made it sound like they were just looking out for my best interests, but I think that the truth is that they didn't want to have to keep competing with my parents for my attention. In any case, it would have made more sense for me to live closer to my parents—so that I could be there for my brother—but V said she wanted me to live near her. Of course, she lives in a better part of town than I do. (Or she _had_ lived in a better part of town. I've no idea if she's still living there.)

I drive to B—, and am happy to see that the bookstore there still has power. The last real bookstore in the county. Not a used bookstore or a supermarket that happens to also sell books.

I swing casually by the self-help section, and surreptitiously make my selections, pretending that it's really the cooking books on the other side of the aisle that I'm interested in.

I find a table in the corner of the café. The place is even more crowded than usual, especially for noon on a workday. Apparently, I'm not the only one who's fled here to escape the power outage.

I get a drink and start reading one of the self-help books, making sure that the cover stays well hidden by the magazines I've grabbed to obscure my choice of reading. Because I don't want people to think that I'm the kind of person who needs to read self-help.

I flip quickly through the pages, shaking my head, because really? Who is this supposed to help? I get all of the way to the end and I'm left hanging.

 _That's it?_

Plus, the idiot sitting behind me keeps knocking into my chair. I shift six inches to the side, to try and give him more room, so that he'll leave me alone, but a minute later a woman clutching a stack of fashion magazines kicks a leg of my chair as she passes.

 _Take a sip_ , I tell myself. I take a sip of my tea.

 _Breathe_ , I tell myself.

Ten shuddering breaths later, the pressure in my chest eases.

It's all a matter of mind over matter. I just have to calm down.

I go up to order another drink.

There're two barristas, one who's competent and one who's pretty (not that those are necessarily mutually exclusive traits, but in this case, they are). The competent one is laughing. She says that she shouldn't have said it was going to be a light day. The pretty one sighs, "At least we're getting tips." I slide a dollar into their jar.

The competent one gives me my drink. "You're always in here studying," she says.

Am I? I suppose I am. "For my Comps," I say, then add, "Comprehensive exams." She smiles. I want to explain what that means, but she's already looking away. I grab some napkins to wipe up the sugar I've apparently spilled during this brilliant exchange.

Back at my table, I start taking notes on a napkin on the self-help advice I'm picking up from the books I've selected.

I fill one entire napkin up with ways to say 'no.'

A book called _10 Days to a Better You_ says: _'Always' and 'never' are fictional. They never happen. When you make goals, set definite timelines._

Still another book says: _Sadness doesn't cause cancer. But it_ allows _cancer._

Does that mean that people who have cancer deserve to be sick? How fucked up is that?

The last line of the book says: _Send your heart energy out to the world._

I don't even know what that means.

A book on panic attacks recommends keeping a "stress record," including the date, time, trigger, duration, and symptoms of my "episodes." It says that I should consider seeing a doctor and getting medication, especially if my anxiety is limiting my social interaction.

Well, I suppose that my "anxiety" _is_ limiting my social interaction, but do I really want to interact more?

A lot of the books have quizzes, and I scribble the answers down on my napkins, even though the results are all self-evident. _Introvert?_ Yeah, I kind of had that one figured out already.

One of the quizzes asks about my social circle: _Who do you phone when you feel stressed?_ For some reason, "No one" isn't an option.

Idly, it occurs to me that bookstores like this are closing because people like me are sitting in the cafés reading the books, not buying them.

But the café sure is making money. You'd figure that at least some of that would go back into keeping the bookshop open.

 _The real enemy isn't the loneliness,_ another book says, _it's the feelings that the loneliness lets you feel._ This is the genius recommendation: _Let yourself feel the pain. It's your fear of it that's the agony._

That sounds like drivel, but I wonder if I'm only being dismissive because I'm mired in the agony of fear.

Fear of what?

Fear of being alone?

No.

Fear of people?

Yes.

The book recommends guided visualization: _Relax your whole body, go to a world where everyone loves you, then return to it whenever you want to._

How is this not the same thing as fantasizing? And isn't my fantasizing—my preference for daydreams over the real world—the source of my problem? Or at least one of my symptoms?

But why do I avoid reality? Because I don't like people. And I avoid people because I'm afraid of them. I'm afraid of them because they hurt me. They hurt me because I don't have enough experience dealing with people to protect myself from the ones who would hurt me.

That is assuming that there are people who _wouldn't_ have it out for me.

Paranoia is apparently one of my symptoms.

One book takes sixty-four pages to try and convince me that people regret most the things they don't do.

Bullshit.

A book on how to make decisions says: _Choose something just above your lowest standard_.

What the fuck?

Actually, on second thought, I decide that that doesn't sound that bad.

My napkins are filling up with notes like this: _Spring back fast, look to the future, remember that things could be worst, don't over-think, write your goals down to make them concrete, see the big pic._

I feel like I already know all of this, though. So how's it supposed to help?

What I need is a book teaching me how to lie, how to manipulate, how to take what I want. Not nonsense about how to make people like the _real_ me, whoever that bitch is.

But I keep plowing through the pile of self-help, and I'm so engrossed that I don't even notice when he sidles up to the table.

He's turning over one of my books to read the title before I realize he's even there.

I'm temporarily frozen in horror.

What's a cop even doing in a bookstore? I'm pretty sure that policemen don't read.

It's not like he could have followed me here. Not unless he's been sitting somewhere watching me this whole time.

Is he the asshole who's been knocking into my chair?

"They're not _How to Get away with Murder_ ," I say, going for indignation because what else can I do? I'm too humiliated to be discovered reading stuff like this to muster up anything approaching civilized discourse.

"You already own more books than anyone I know," he says, pulling up a chair that's just become free to sit down on the far side of my tiny table. "Why're you hanging out in a bookstore?"

It feels like a set-up. Like V asking _Why do you need those books?_ in that accusatory tone of hers (or maybe the accusation in her voice is just in my head, because every time I remember something she said, her words always have that same tone).

"Why d'you have so many books?" he prods.

Like I need an excuse. But maybe in this day and age I do.

"Have you read all of them?" he wants to know, of course, because real book collectors have always got books they haven't read. And non-book collectors use that against them, like there's something really sinful and avaricious about hoarding books, when really, I just do it so that I'll still have something to read when the last bookshops in the world have closed forever and reading's outlawed.

I shake my head.

Then he says, "I don't mean anything by it."

But he does.

He shrugs. "It's just that I never get time to read. So I guess I'm envious."

Right.

"My parents bought books instead of food," I say, and it's the truth. Every wall of my parents' trailer is lined with bookshelves, the cheap metal kind of bookshelves that fold from the weight, and the books are all shoved in pell mell, the volumes on each shelf actually supporting the weight of the shelf above it, so that pulling out just one volume means risking a collapse. I've had an entire bookcase of books shower down on me. More than once. The hazards of reading.

So yeah, my family would eat nothing but canned beans for whole weeks, but we always had something to read.

Then my parents started buying alcohol instead of books, but that's another story.

"Is it a fad?" he asks.

"What do you mean?" I am confused, because reading's not a fad. Or it shouldn't be. It's a basic human right, like listening to music. Like breathing.

"You're not Asian," he clarifies.

I understand then. He means the Zen Institute. "So I can't be interested in Buddhism?" It isn't like I'm trying to steal someone's cultural heritage. Besides, he's not Asian. It's not like he has a personal stake in the matter. I don't need to justify myself to him.

He shakes his head. "I have a cousin who calls herself a witch. I think she's just trying to be different. I mean, why can't you be happy with what you've got?"

"What I've got?"

"You know, church."

"Christianity?" I think he's just baiting me. But I fully intend to bait back.

"Yeah."

"You do know that Jesus stole his religion from Buddha, don't you?" I say, just to be a bitch. "That is," I add, to really dig the knife in, "assuming that Jesus even existed."

He gapes at me, so I know that I won that round. That is, if dismissing an entire religion—actually two religions, Christians and Muslims, since Muslims consider Jesus a prophet—if dismissing an entire religion can be considered winning.

Really, I'm just trying to piss him off. And I'm saying things that I wouldn't say to a student or to a teacher, because I'm trying to offend him.

But then I remember that he thinks I'm a joke.

"That's just a conspiracy theory," I admit. "I'm not saying that I believe it." I adopt an imperious tone. "I neither know nor care if Jesus existed or went to India."

"Then why say it?"

I don't want to admit that I was just trying to annoy him off. "The existence of Jesus and his possible influences constitute valid historical questions."

"Is that what you're researching? At school? Christianity?"

My dissertation's supposed to be about the early Christian movement in Egypt. I'm not touching first century Christianity, though. Scholars of first and second generation Christianity are hardcore and there ain't no way that I'm going anywhere near them. But I don't want the cop to know that, so I shrug.

He's not letting it go though. "You do that a lot, don't you?"

"Do what?"

"Try to shock people."

Do I? I don't think that I do.

Maybe he just means that he thinks I intentionally try to seem _different_ , like his poor cousin, who can't even be a Neo-Pagan witch without him giving her shit. I bet he thinks that secretly she and I are just like everyone else. Normal, but troublemakers.

In fact, he probably thinks that everyone is exactly the same and that any sign of deviation is a deliberate act of spiteful non-conformity. And it's his job as a cop to enforce sameness.

I feel a pang of pity him even as I gloat a bit over the discovery of yet another thing to dislike about him.

"You don't strike me as very religious," I observe.

"I don't?"

"You're a cop," I say, as if it's self-explanatory.

He bristles. "I'm a _detective._ And I don't see what that has to do with it."

"You're not very nice. As a _collective_ , I mean. The police don't appear to be very interested in _loving thy neighbor_ , if you know what I mean."

"We keep the order so that others can enjoy the peace."

"Hmph."

"It's easy to be judge someone from the sidelines."

"I thought that's where you wanted me. On the sidelines. Out of your investigation."

He opens his mouth to say something, then pauses, like I've taken him by surprise again. Maybe I'm not shocking; maybe he's just boring. "Yeah," he nods. "How's that going for you?" He glances down at the stack of self-help books and I feel the heat of humiliation again.

"Just fine," I reply primly.

"That's good." He watches me.

I watch him watching me.

"Is there something you wanted?" I ask.

He shakes his head.

"Did you actually come in here just to watch me read?"

He blinks. "I came in here to buy a present."

"Well then, don't let me stop you." I'm willing to accept his story about meeting me by coincidence.

But it's going in the _Memoirs to Prove the Non-Existence of the World_ , because I don't like coincidences. They're suspicious (and I thought so well before _The Matrix_ came out).

"I've been trying to contact you," he tells me.

"Have you?" I'm going to play it cool. Like Barbara Stanwyck in _Double Indemnity._ _They ain't got nothin' on me._

"You not answering your phone?"

Instead of replying, I pull out said phone, pursing my lips when I find that it is indeed off. "I had to turn it off while I was taking a test, and I must have forgotten to turn it back on," I explain, powering it up and checking to make sure that I haven't missed a call from my brother.

"Two days in a row—it makes a person worry."

I doubt that. He was probably just suspicious that I'd skipped town. (I smile to myself at the image of me "skipping town.")

But he's going for good cop right now. "I tried your work. I even tried your place."

"Well, I'm here." And I take a swig of my tea like it's bootleg whiskey.

"Have you noticed anyone watching you?"

I start to cough, because whatever I expected him to say, _that_ certainly wasn't it.

He rises from his seat and reaches out like he's going to pat my back and I pull away shaking my head, because I don't want a damn thing from him.

"What d'you mean?" I ask when I can breathe again.

"You know, like anyone lurking."

I figure he's just trying to rattle me, because there's no way he's serious about this. You don't just come up to someone in a bookshop and ask her if she's being stalked. Especially if you're a cop. "Why're you asking?" Because it's only fair that he give me some information in return.

He's fiddling with one of the books on the table now, and it's getting on my nerves, the way he's fucking with the cover. "Maybe someone's taken a special interest in you. We've been assuming it was the Zen Institute was the link, but it might be you."

"Me?"

"So have you noticed anyone following you around?"

If this is a serious concern, shouldn't he have asked me about it already? I mean, why's he only thinking about this now? Has new evidence has come to light?

Perhaps it's just hard for him to imagine anyone—even a murderer—giving a fuck about me one way or another.

It's not like _he_ gives a shit about me. He's just doing due diligence by telling me this new theory, so that the department doesn't get sued if something happens to me.

Which is insane. Because no one cares about me enough to kill me. No one gives a good goddamn about me at all.

Except my parents. I can just see my mother wailing in some courtroom, sobbing that the police didn't take care of her baby girl, when the truth is, the only thing she'll miss is the fact that I won't be around to give her any more money.

"Why no, officer," I reply in a sickly sweet tone, "I haven't seen anyone lurking around my door. Have you?"

He's glaring at me again, which is ok, because I don't like him pretending to care about my well-being. "Can you think of anyone who might want to do you harm?"

"Every single person I know wants to do me harm." It's not true, I don't think, but it gives me a sick sense of vindication to proclaim myself like this.

He scoffs. "Not very many friends then?"

"How did you put it?" I cock my head to the side in thought. "Oh yes, I'm 'a lonely, bored woman.' And I need 'to get a life.'" I shrug. "What can I say? People don't like me."

"Whose fault is that?"

"Mine. Obviously. Hence this." I gesture at the collection of books littering the table.

"Even this?" He holds up the book he'd been fiddling with. On dream interpretation.

"Oneirology is an established area of psychoanalysis," I tell him, even though I only got the book on a lark, because of that fucked up dream about my Tulpa. Strangely, the book didn't include a section on dreams about imaginary friends.

"Oneirology?"

"Dream interpretation."

"Always have to have a big word for everything, don't you?"

"It's how I justify my existence." I won't let him make me feel bad about this again. Everything I have, I've earned, including my vocabulary.

"But you don't believe in this crap, do you?"

"Depends." I drop my voice. "Do you like going down on women?" Yeah, we're in a crowded bookshop and my question's inappropriate, and for all I know, he'll arrest me just for asking—is being rude to a cop an arrest-able offense?—but maybe he's right and I _do_ try to get a rise out of people. I'm a provocateur.

"Excuse me?"

"Artemidorus said a dream-interpreter has to know as much about his client as possible." I'm practically whispering, my voice is so low. And the detective has to lean towards me across the table to hear. "The Romans weren't supposed to like going down on women. It was fine for a woman to go down on a guy, but the opposite, not so much." I shake my head like there was something clearly wrong with the ancient Romans when it came to oral sex. But otherwise I'm all nonchalant, like I talk about stuff like this with guys—with cops—in bookshops every day. "Artemidorus had this client who actually _liked_ going down on his wife, which was crazy in Artemidorus' opinion, but it meant that it wasn't necessarily a bad thing when this guy would dream about it. Anyone else, a dream like that would have meant something awful. That's why Artemidorus said that you had to know as much about your client as possible. Dream interpretation is a key to the soul."

"The soul?" He sounds like he doesn't believe me. Like I'd make all this up just to fuck with him.

And I haven't even told him what Artemidorus said about dreams starring penises with beards.

"Why not?" I ask.

"A dream's just a dream." He leans back again, crossing his arms, like he wants me to know that he's on to me.

"The Gnostics said it was the _waking_ world that was the dream. That _everyone_ was asleep."

"The who?"

"The Gnostics. Not _ag-_ gnostic. That's something different." Because by this point, I _am_ fucking with him. Who is he to ruin my afternoon like this? I'm just trying to improve myself, read a little self-help, and he's got to make fun of me. Well, fuck him.

"You seem to think this is a joke," he says.

"No, you think _I_ 'm a joke."

"We could do this down at the station," he threatens, and it reminds me of Dana Andrews telling Gene Tierney that he's going to take her in for questioning, and I don't like it. Because I'm not Gene Tierney—she was beautiful and graceful and everything I'm not—and he's definitely not Dana Andrews.

"So let's go," I say. I'm not afraid of him.

Which is of course a lie. My hands are shaking, I'm so upset.

He doesn't say anything for a minute. Then he leans towards me across the table again, his voice low now, like he wants to impart a secret. "You know, if you've got something you want to tell me, you can. You can confide in me."

I wonder if he means it. Really means it.

I wonder what he'd say if I told him that I hated my life. That I hated my job and that I didn't know why I was in school and that I hated the fact that he'd met my mother—that he'd seen what she was like and that, for now on, he'd see her when he looked at me.

I wonder what he'd say if I told him about V and J. If I told him that yes, I had people following me around, but just in my head. If I said that, wherever the two of them are right now, I'm pretty sure V and J aren't wasting any of their time thinking about me.

I wonder what he'd say if I told him about my Tulpa. If I told him that I'm so lonely that I actually decided to invent an imaginary friend.

I wonder what he'd say if I told him that the murders started right after I went to work on my Tulpa.

But what would be the point of admitting all of this? What could he possibly have to say to me in response?

For one crazy moment, I imagine him telling me that I know who did the killing. I imagine telling him that I was right about seeing someone in that garage the night that I found a dead man lying in an alley. That I saw my Tulpa, because my Tulpa is the killer. Because I created a murderer.

Then, for an even crazier moment, I imagine confessing that _I_ 'm the killer, that my Tulpa has been covering for me all along. In my head, I see that picture taken of my car on a speed camera when the second victim was killed, but someone other than me is behind the wheel of the car in the picture. A dark, shadowy figure. My Tulpa, giving me an alibi while I'm back at the Zen Institute.

What's wrong with me? Why would I even think things like this?

It's just that I'm so used to everyone saying everything's my fault. My mother. V. And now this cop.

But it's not my fault. I didn't do anything. And it's not fair that this cop has been treating me like a suspect.

I have to clear my throat before I can talk. "I haven't got anything to say."

He stands up abruptly, and I think that he's really going to do it. He's going to arrest me.

"Watch out for yourself," he tells me, surprising me again, then he's turning on his heel and walking away.

I don't know if he's forgotten that he came in for a present or if he was lying about that, but he doesn't bother to purchase anything before he leaves the shop.

 _Wake up_ , that's what the Gnostics would say. _Wake up._

 **AN:**

 **Friendly reminder – Dana Andrews is the actor who played the detective in** _ **Laura**_ **. Gene Tierney is the female lead.**

 **Based on my copious research (watching** _ **Law & Order**_ **) I am breaking quite a few rules with my depiction of the police officer in this story, but I hope that I'm not pushing the bounds of credibility too far.**

 **The Propertius translation is taken from the Penguin Classics, translated by W. G. Shepherd. A few more lines from the poem: "Here may I reveal unchecked my hidden sorrows, If only these isolated rocks keep faith. From what first cause, my Cynthia, Shall I derive your contempt? …Is some new girl the cause of your harshness? No other pretty feet have crossed my threshold – Trifler, you may give yourself to me again…" Propertius wrote several poems like this to a lover named Cynthia. Scholars argue about whether Cynthia actually existed or was just a foil for Propertius' poetic angst.**

 **If you're interested in the debate about Jesus' historicity, Richard Carrier is a good place to start. Right now, the historical consensus is that Jesus did in fact exist and that Christians did not steal Christianity from Buddhists. However, there was contact between the Roman Empire and the east during this period and some Christians were clearly annoyed by competition with eastern religion (for instance, see Clement of Alexandria).**


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me. (If I'm not mistaken, this chapter contains a more or less direct quote from Meyers. It's credited at the end.)**

I've found out that advisors are supposed to tell their students whether or not they've passed a departmental exam (like written Comps, or the four language exams that I've had to take for this program) within _two weeks_ of the students taking the exams. It's motherfucking department policy.

My advisor has exceeded this deadline _every fucking time_.

All of the other students who took their Comps alongside me have already given their oral defenses.

I tell myself that it doesn't mean anything.

But of course it does.

What can I do though?

So I'm pretending like there's a point—like I shouldn't just throw in the towel and withdraw from the university. To that end, I've scheduled a meeting with one of the committee members for my dissertation. He's already read the notes for my prospectus, and he's been giving me valuable feedback for turning it into a final dissertation.

I don't think my advisor's read a single thing I've given him on the project.

I go into the meeting resolved to pretend that I don't feel like shit. And it's going ok, I think, until he says.

"I was surprised that I didn't see anything about Gnosticism in here," he says.

I shrug, because I don't want to talk about this with him anymore than I want to talk about this with my advisor.

He goes on. "It's just, how can you talk about early Christianity in Egypt without talking about Gnosticism."

And because he's young—the youngest member of my committee—and because I genuinely like him, I decide to be honest for once. I say "It's not like I don't think it's important. It's just, I like Gnosticism. I really do." The fact that I've admitted this much is a big thing, and I'm hoping that he doesn't realize how big. That he just assumes that I'm into Gnosticism the same way I'm into watching shows about finding Bigfoot—because it's entertaining, not because I necessarily think there's anything to it. "But it seems like an indulgence, doesn't it, to write about something you like?" I say it just like that too, as if I'm a contrite Puritan, afraid of letting myself enjoy anything too much for fear it'll be a sin.

"Well, you have to enjoy what you do, don't you? Otherwise, why would you get out of bed in the morning?" he asks.

As if it's that easy. As if people actually go around doing what they like. Getting what they want.

I tell him that I'll think about adding Gnosticism to the mix, but it's mostly just to make him happy. It's not until later, when I'm sitting at my computer at work, doing data entry, that I really consider what it is he's suggesting. I think about what it might be like to write about something I'm actually interested in.

But can I really stand to put myself on the line like that?

Because it's not just the subject matter—it's not just that it's _Gnosticism_ , I mean—it's that I'm pushing for something for myself. Something that I want for myself.

He made it sound so easy. So easy that it almost starts to feel like it might in fact be easy.

And it's such a surprisingly pleasant sensation—the warm feeling that creeps over me as I think about doing this for myself—that I feel my mood lifting. I even start humming to myself.

I'm still humming when my cell phone rings.

I see that it's my brother and answer with a chipper "What's up?"

But it's not good.

My brother's crying and he's telling me that there are police at the trailer.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

i'm feeling so sick and i wish that i could just ride on by, just keep going like i made a wrong turn but my brother's waiting for me and i can't just leave him so i pull up and there's a cop and he's waving his hand like he doesn't want me here but that's my family

that's my family, i tell him, leaning through the window of my car

that's my family, i say, even though it makes me sick to admit it and guilty for feeling sick

the cop stops telling me to leave so i put the car in park and i start to get out of the car

and my mother's screaming

i can hear her screaming and god i hate her i hate her i hate her

i can't even understand what's she's screaming she's just possessed by that crazy wild mania that she gets sometimes maybe from her father because he killed himself

and i can hear my father screaming and god i hate him i hate him i hate him

the way he smells the way he looks the way he thinks it's ok that he does what he does and that he'll go to heaven but there's no way that's ok there's no way that someone can just do stuff like that and there be no recompense

and there are cuffs on the two of them

the police are putting my parents in the back of two cruisers

one cruiser for each of them

and the cop who didn't want to let me stop is saying ma'am

he's saying ma'am at me like i'm a person a legitimate person that he's got to treat with some respect when i ain't nothin' i'm just trailer trash and i know he thinks so and his condescension is like knives

where's my brother i ask because that's the only reason i came the only thing i care about where's my brother because if something's happened to him i'll die i'll just die i'll kill myself

i won't throw myself in front of a subway train because that's selfish that hurts all of the people who're wounded in the crash but i'll go away i'll go to the desert and i'll leave my car and wander until i'm dead because i know that's how people die out there with no water

i won't even go to that diner and work behind a counter i'll just die

and there's my brother he's ok he's ok but he's crying and they're not letting him come to me so it makes me wild just makes me wild that they're keeping me from him like maybe i'll start screaming too and the police will have to cuff me and take me away in my own cruiser because the police aren't letting me get to my brother so that i can make sure he's ok and that's not ok the cops can't just do whatever they want i need to see my brother

then i've got him and he's ok i can see for myself he's not bleeding or broken anywhere except maybe in places you can't see to look at with your eyes and i've got to take him out of here i've got to take him out of here because we're not trash we're better than this and everyone living in this piece of shit trailer park has come out and is watching us but they can fucking go to hell along with these cops because i'm not leaving my brother here

you can't take him they say you can't take him which is bullshit because he's my brother and i tell them that he's my brother and no fucking way are they taking him from me

i should have taken him already i should have stolen him and driven away to that diner in the middle of nowhere and then none of this would be happening

they're going to put him in foster care they're going to give him to a pedophile (i just know it) or a junky and there's nothing i can do about it they say except file a petition a fucking petition because they're going to give my brother away to someone who likes to feel up little kids and there's no fucking way, just no fucking way, that i'm letting them do and i don't give a fuck who they think they are

"I'm sorry," I sob, "I shouldn't have called you. I'm sorry." But I'm just so grateful that I still have his card and that he answered. And I know he thinks I'm calling about the murders, but I'm hoping against hope that he can do something to help me, because who else do I know who can talk to these people who are here trying to take my brother away?

"Where are you?" the detective asks.

I'm crying too hard, though, so the bitch social worker takes the phone away from me and talks into it and I'm still crying when she hands it back to me.

"I'll be there in ten minutes," he says. "Don't worry."

And I hang up and I hug my brother, still crying, because I don't know what I'll do but I know that I'll do anything to keep my brother.

I'll even call that detective and beg him for his help.

Not that he should actually be able to lend me any assistance. He works homicide, and this is a domestic disturbance. And when Child Protective Services is involved, it's a whole other can of worms, isn't it?

But for some reason, he's on the way.

He shouldn't be getting involved. He should have said to me, "Sorry to hear about it," and "Find a lawyer."

Instead, he's driving all of the way out here.

And here he is, flashing his badge. He glances at me and for a split second, I'm afraid that I've made it worse, that he's going to tell all of these people how I'm crazy and a murder suspect and that they shouldn't let anywhere near my brother.

He takes the bitch social worker aside and they talk to each other for a while in hushed tones. I'd give anything to hear what they're saying to each other. At the same time, I don't want to know. I just wish this wasn't happening.

They're done talking now, and somehow the bitch social worker's suddenly remembered that it's entirely within her purview to leave my brother in my care because I've got a job and a home and who the fuck is she to try to keep him from me anyhow?

"Just doing my job ma'am," she says and I don't say _Fuck off_ even though I want to, because I'm not an idiot.

They let me and my brother go inside my parents' trailer to pack some of his things. It's a war zone inside, but I ignore that because the mess isn't really anything new. We throw my brother's stuff into garbage bags.

The detective's waiting for us when we come back outside.

"Let me drive you home," he says.

"I've got my car," I tell him, because I'm ok now, everything's ok now, and he's already done so much for me already, I'll never be able to repay him, and I can't impose on him any more than I already have.

"You're too upset to drive."

"I feel better now."

But he's holding his hand out for the keys and I want everyone watching—the social worker and the two cops and everyone in that trailer park—I want them all to know that I'm being responsible, I'm not putting my brother's life at risk by driving when I'm emotionally distraught, so I hand the keys over. "What about your car?" I ask.

"My partner's driving it."

So he _does_ have a partner, and looking over I see a guy in a blue suit who I recognize from that first night at the subway. I just never realized that they were partners.

The detective's shaking hands with my brother, introducing himself. "Edward," the cop says, no last name, like he's just a friend.

My brother introduces himself in turn, his face dry and his shoulders back, and I can't help smiling, because I love my brother so much and I'm so proud of him for standing up like he's got nothing to be ashamed of and I don't give a fuck what anyone here thinks about him.

Anyone who says he's trash will have to deal with me.

We get into my car, my brother in the back and the detective at the wheel. As per usual, the engine has to think about it at first, but it eventually turns over, and then the detective is weaving my car through the remaining gawkers and out of the trailer park.

"How do you know my sister?" my brother asks before we're on the highway.

My heart—which shouldn't be capable of taking any more stress—flips over, and I cut the detective off before he can say anything. "We met at a bar."

"What were you doing in a bar?" my brother asks skeptically. He's heard me say enough about my parents' drinking to be surprised, maybe, that I would go to such a place.

"I have to go. For work, you know. Whether you want to or not, you have to go to happy hours sometimes. You don't have to drink, though." Which is a lie. You have to drink or they make you feel like crap. But I don't want my brother to know that he won't have a choice when it comes to him one day going to happy hours just to fit in.

My brother seems satisfied with this response and the detective glances at me out of the side of his eyes, but he doesn't contradict me either.

"Thanks for coming to help," I say to the detective.

"No problem," he says, sounding easy-like, as if it's the truth. But I figure he's probably a really good liar.

"You're not going to get in trouble, are you?" I ask, with only a tinge of guilt because I don't really care if he gets in trouble, do I? He could get fired and I'd still do the same thing all over again. My brother's more important than anything or anyone else.

"It'll be fine."

I consider trying to explain about my parents, but what would be the point? They are who they are. There's nothing to say.

I don't want to ask my brother any questions about what happened either, not in front of the detective. Besides, I already know what happened. I might not have the specifics, but they don't really matter. It could've been anything,

When I was a kid, I remember always feeling like the truth was so inadequate. Kids at school would talk about how they'd heard on the news how some woman had used a frying pan to cave in her husband's skull, just for refusing to turn down the tv. " _Who does that?_ they'd say, all shock and middle class decorum. But I understood. And I would imagine myself having to explain it all to the police one day: ' _This is what my parents do to each other._ ' I'd imagine the disgust on the cops' faces as they listened, the disbelief, the bald truth hardly sufficient explanation for the damage done, the blood drawn by some passing remark, the suffering caused by forcing another to endure the grosser of one's physical excesses.

So we sit in the car in silence. I'm too exhausted to feel uncomfortable. I'm just grateful, so fucking fucking fucking grateful to the detective for saving me and my brother like this.

I have to remind the detective which exit to take, so I guess he's never taken this route to my place. He finds a parking space and I'm surprised when he opens the back door and pulls out two of the garbage bags with my brother's belongings. He helps us carry them inside.

Just when I realize that the detective's stuck at my place with no transportation, his cell phone rings.

"That's my partner. Here with the car," he says.

I don't know how to thank him for what he's done.

"Thank you," I say. "Thank you so much."

He shakes his head like it was nothing and leaves.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The next morning, I call my supervisor and tell her what happened. I offer to give her the name of the detective and his cell number if she wants to verify it, because I know that I've taken a lot of leave lately and I'm sorry, but I've got to stay home with my brother.

She says it's alright, don't worry. In reality, she probably thinks that I'm just nothing but drama, what with V and J and then a dead body and now this. But I'm a good worker. She no doubt suspects that I spend a good part of my time sitting at my desk not working (studying and reading fanfiction and staring at dust motes float through the air), yet my productivity is still twice that of the other research assistants, so I guess she's decided to put up with my "drama."

My brother and I spend most of the day eating popcorn and watching DVDs together.

I offered him my room but he refused, opting for the couch instead. I know that he probably just wants the couch because the tv is in the living room, but that's fine with me.

Before dinner, I make him come with me to Home Depot so that we can buy some folding doors and some hinges. When we get back home, we hook the doors together like screens so that he can put them up in the living room and have some privacy. I figure that he'll insist on having his own room soon enough, but I don't know how long he'll end up staying with me.

I've called several law firms and I'm waiting to hear back. There's some kind of legal service available at the university for graduate students, but I'm not taking chances on some low budget outfit. I'll quit school and get a second job to pay for a lawyer if I have to. I'm keeping my brother.

My brother has a game console—I bought it for Christmas—and after setting up a fake bedroom for him we go to a game store and buy him a couple of other games. We stay up late playing, or more accurately, he stays up late playing and I stay up late reading online about family law.

Now it's Saturday and my brother is heading out early with his skateboard. I eye him through the window, watching him like a creeper as he tries to do tricks in the parking lot below. After a while, a couple of other kids join him and I retreat to the kitchen and start baking a cake out of a box—anything to keep myself busy. I'm too anxious to sit still, waiting for all of those lawyers to call me back and stressed out about some of the finer points of family law that I found online last night.

It occurs to me that maybe I should try to meditate, because it's supposed to help people relax. But all it ever does is cause me to panic, and I can't take any more of that.

The cake's just come out of the oven when the doorbell rings.

My heart starts racing because I've always hated people coming to the door—they only ever come because they want something from me, and it's so hard to say 'no,' and it reminds me of answering the door when I was a kid, trying to open the door without letting whoever it was on the doorstep from seeing the chaos inside—and I can't imagine who it could be and I'm already assuming that they're there to tell me that something's happened to my brother.

So I can't help feeling relieved when I see it's the detective.

There's part of me, in the back of everything, that's thinking how strange it is to be looking at him and feeling relief. But mostly, I'm just so grateful that I don't even care why he's there.

I'm rational enough, though, to know that he's probably here about the murders. But he doesn't look like he's dressed for work. He's wearing a plain black t-shirt and a pair of jeans.

"She's a friend of mine," he says, handing me a card. "Well, the wife of a friend, really, but she's a good lawyer. I already told her that you might be calling."

The card says _Family Law_ and I realize that he's doing me another favor. "I can pay," I say, to make sure he knows that I know that this isn't going to be free. "I'm going to start looking for a part-time job—"

"She won't charge you an arm and a leg," he cuts me off.

"Just the leg," I joke, because I don't want to acknowledge the fact that I owe him, yet again.

I feel like he should be glaring at me. I feel like he should be lecturing me for having the kind of parents who'd get me in a jam like this, who'd get _him_ in a jam like this, but for once his face isn't hard. And it's crazy, but I'd swear he's got Dana Andrews' eyes, the ones that look almost kind, so I look away.

"I wasn't lying about the garage," I tell him, because maybe now he'll believe me, now that he knows that I'm indebted to him, now I _owe_ him the truth. "I really thought that I saw someone. But I could have been wrong."

"I didn't come about that."

"Oh." And I make the mistake of looking at him again.

He looks almost nervous, his eyes looking at everything but me. It doesn't make any sense that he'd be nervous, though, and it occurs to me that he's really only here to check out the apartment, to make sure that I've got it set up for my brother.

I start to tell him how we put up the screens in the living room, to give my brother privacy, but when I glance from the screens to him again, he's looking at me.

"So you're ok?" he asks.

"Yeah, my brother's great. He's outside, playing."

"No, I mean you. Are _you_ ok?"

"I'm fine."

"That's good."

Then it hits me. The way he's looking at me. The fact that he's done me all of these favors—working it all out with the bitch from CPS, driving us home, getting me a family lawyer—why would he do all of this unless he wants something from me? And what could I possibly have to offer him?

I know he's still trying to solve the murders. And maybe he still thinks that I know more than I'm saying. Now that he's got me in his debt, I suppose he's hoping that I'll confide in him. But would he really go through all of this just to solve a case? And he just denied that he was here for the investigation.

The way I see it, that only leaves one option.

The notion that he could want me like that is hard to believe.

But he's done so much for me—he's given me my brother, safe and sound, and I'd pay almost any price to have that.

Not that I know what to do at this point. I've had sex before, of course, but this isn't just sex. This is _seduction_.

"Do you want some tea or something?" I ask, dredging up some common courtesy out of the place where I store my meager knowledge of the way decent people behave when cops show up uninvited at their door.

"Sure."

So I lead him to the kitchen, but when I turn around to put the tea on the kettle—by which I mean, put the mug of filtered water in the microwave—he's right there.

I mean, _right_ there.

I kiss him, which is to say that I smash my mouth to his, because I assume that that's what I'm supposed to do.

And surprisingly, he's kissing me back. So I guess that I'm doing it alright, whatever _this_ is, this seduction, this femme fatale scene, which is surprising in its own way, because I'm just supposed to be the waitress behind the counter. I'm not supposed to have an affair with the cop.

I decide to go with the flow. Since I don't know when my brother will be back, we'll have to be fast. I pull the detective out of the kitchen and towards my bedroom.

I have to push the books off of my bed and there are crumbs on my sheets and I haven't shaved today, but I think the cop likes the way that I go for the button on his jeans, like I'm eager or something, which is really just a cover for my anxiety.

I haven't got any condoms, but he has one in his wallet, and I wonder if he always carries one, if he always has sex with his witnesses.

But then I realize that he's not like the Romans at all, because he _does_ go down on women.

At which time, I decide that I don't care if he does have with all of his witnesses, since at least that means more practice for him, much more practice than I have, that's for sure—just the one guy once and then only because I didn't want to be a virgin anymore (because being a virgin's like not drinking; it's better to just do it than to be heckled about not doing it). I lost my virginity at a costume party in high school, anonomity my insurance, since I wasn't actually on the guest list, I wasn't cool enough for that, and I certainly didn't want to be recognized by the guy I chose (who was uncouth enough to have sex with a girl he didn't recognize but not uncouth enough to lie about having a disease). Not recognizing me meant that he couldn't tell everyone afterwards how much the trailer trash whore sucked in bed—not that he implied any displeasure, but I wasn't taking any chances.

I don't want to disappoint now, though. Not when I owe this cop so much. So I pretend like this is a fanfiction and he's not just Edward, he's _the_ Edward, and I'm not just Isabella, I'm _the_ Bella.

I let her take over, the other _me_ , and I bite his neck.

I think he likes it, what with the way he's groaning.

But it's over so fast and he looks worried, like he's afraid that I might think that this is more than it is.

I'm going to reassure him that I do indeed know what this is, but his cell phone rings. "You probably have to get that," I say, to give him an out.

"You didn't—" he doesn't finish what he was going to say, and I realize that he's upset that I didn't come. I get that I should've faked it, but I thought that we'd have more time.

"I'm fine," I say, because really, I don't think my pleasure was the point and his cell phone is still ringing.

I hand the phone to him and turn away to start pulling on my clothes, not listening to his side of the call, which sounds like it has to do with work.

"Gotta go?" I ask, turning around when it's clear that the call's over.

He's already getting dressed. "Sorry," he says. "I've got something with another case."

I nod and leave the bedroom so that he can finish getting dressed without me hanging around.

I go into the kitchen and cut a piece of the cake that's just finished cooking. It isn't the kind of cake that gets frosting so it's ready to eat as is. I wrap the piece up in a piece of foil and hand it to the detective as he's passing.

"Thanks," he says and I shrug because I feel stupid, giving him a piece of cake like that.

Besides, I know that we're still not even.

He hesitates by the door. "Take care of yourself."

"Sure."

"And your brother."

"Definitely."

And then he's gone.

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I remember how I used to lie to V and J. They were always asking me so many questions. Always wanting to know everything about me. I would sometimes make up stories just so that I would have something to say to them, just to feel a little less insignificant.

They thought I was a virgin, either because I was always lying so much to them that they didn't know what to believe, or because it didn't fit the picture of me that they had in their heads.

V would sometimes try to call me out. "Oh come on—" she'd say, but J would tell her to be quiet, to let me keep talking, because he thought the lies were just as revealing as the truth, I suppose, which is bullshit, because I was only talking because they were making me.

Why couldn't they leave me alone?

And why was it so hard to believe that I'd dated an artist in college? An asshole in high school? Or all of the other guys who I invented just so that I'd have something to say? Don't other people date? Why was it so hard for V and J to believe that I was like everyone else?

But they thought that I was so innocent. So ripe for picking.

I remember J hesitating when he admitted it. "I want to—" he paused, second-guessing himself.

"What?" I said. "Just say it."

"I want to corrupt you," he said.

And I laughed, because how can you corrupt another person? Aren't we each of us whatever we're supposed to be? The notion that a person can be warped, be made other than what she or he actually was, seems like nonsense. Whatever we're exposed to, it's still _us_ who does the choosing. _Us_ who comes through the other side.

But he was serious.

Just what did this corruption entail, I wondered? And is corruption only ever in one direction? Towards degradation?

Can't you corrupt someone in the other direction?

I asked just that, but J refused to countenance the notion.

He was wrong.

And yeah, I know just how common it is to find a fanfiction Edward trying to corrupt Bella, but I can't help wishing for a story where it's the other way around. Where Edward thinks that he's corrupting Bella, while all along she's really corrupting him.

I imagine the two of them quibbling.

 _They're in a gallery, looking at a painting by some_ _Pre-Raphaelite of a virgin in her tower._

" _What's wrong with it?" Bella asks._

 _Edward has got his head cocked to the side. "She's—unmade."_

" _Unmade?"_

" _Uncorrupted."_

 _Bella is exasperated by his response. He's so boorish. "So what would you have her do? Leave?"_

" _I don't think she could resist. And afterwards…she wouldn't be the same. She'd be free. Don't you see? She's put herself in a prison."_

" _She's not in a prison. She's happy."_

" _How can she be happy if she doesn't have a chance to experience anything?"_

" _That's exactly why."_

" _But doesn't she realize what she's missing?"_

 _Bella scoffs._

 _Edward chances a glance at Bella. "I would—" he breaks off and starts again. "I would like to see her_ corrupted _."_

" _Unlikely."_

" _What's she afraid of?"_

" _Nothing."_

" _Then what's the problem?"_

 _Bella doesn't want to admit the truth, but she doesn't see any way around it. "That's how you see me? Unmade?"_

 _Edward shrugs._

 _"And how would you have me be finished?"_

 _Edward hesitates. Can he say it out loud? "I would—I would have you_ _corrupted._ _"_

 _Her jaw falls open. She gazes at him in shock. "Corrupted?" She's quiet for a moment, then purses her lips. "What of you?" Her eyes sweeps over him, head to toe and back again. "Could you be corrupted too?"_

 _"No. I'm already corrupt." The suggestion is nonsensical._

 _"So a person can only be corrupted towards—what is it—debauchery? You want me debauched?"_

There's more to it, naturally. Like in so many other _Twilight_ fanfictions, this Edward and Bella have been reunited after a long separation. Six years have passed since they've last seen each other. Enough time, surely, for old wounds to heal.

But just look at me. Just look at how much time had passed and I still wasn't over V and J.

I sometimes read reviews complaining that there's something wrong with the Edwards and the Bellas who go years and years without recovering from heartache, because a normal person isn't supposed to take that long to get over something like that.

Which is just further evidence that I'm fucked up.

It's like an addiction, though, isn't it? Going back over the memories of your heartache again and again and again.

Just like reading and rereading and rereading the same fanfictions that reuse the same characters and the same scenarios. It hurts but at least it's familiar.

I felt so guilty when I first started reading fanfiction, so very betrayed by myself. Because whoever I was, I was at least a grown woman and a feminist. I had no excuse to be so enthralled by stories like this, not just romances, but romances starring victim Bellas, Bellas who needed knights on white horses.

Researching what I'd come to think of as "my condition" (my newfound penchant for fanfiction), I found a blog written by a feminist in her thirties who said that she loved _Twilight_ because it let her feel feelings she'd not felt since she was a teenager. Heartbreak and happiness, the two of them sometimes indistinguishable they hurt so much. Emotions she'd long since banished because they weren't compatible with maturity and feminism.

It made me feel a little better for being so obsessed with all of these stories of innocence violated and subjugated in the name of desire. Cliché-ridden plots in which Bella's a virgin. _Of course she's a virgin_ ,and if she isn't, then at least make her awkward or, better yet, _wounded_ , her reluctance for sex making her as a good as a virgin. She's not pretty—she doesn't _think_ she's pretty, but of course _he_ thinks she is. _You don't see yourself clearly._ The bullshit just lapping at the edges, with Edwards who are all green eyes and a smirk in a suit. _Why not?_ He's made of money too but that doesn't matter. _Of course it doesn't matter_. Because he doesn't think his money makes him better than her. _Even though it does._

And I know that none of it's true. I know not a fucking word of it is true. Like I could have my own little _Masen University_ and find a professor who wants me to play Beatrice to his Dante, a virgin on a pedestal, and never let me down, that son-of-a-bitch.

As if what's been broken can be fixed.

As if what hurts can sometimes feel good. Frustration and heartache displaced to the pain from the slap of a belt.

It's probably not healthy the way I go around fantasizing all of the time, making up stories about Bella and Edward. I suppose that I get off on the fact that it's not _me_ suffering, even though it _is_ me, insofar as I'm the one doing the fantasizing, the one who's suffering as I imagine the suffering. But at least for once the suffering I'm vicariously suffering's not connected to the way the subway attendant always glares at me, the way that my coworkers dump their unwanted tasks on me or the way that my advisor ignores me, the fact that everyone thinks I'm so sweet—so innocent—so utterly lacking in a backbone that they can walk all over me, or the way that this detective just seems to have expected me to have sex with him, the only guy who's paid attention to me in I-don't-even-know-how-long taking an interest in me not (I assume) because I'm pretty or clever or funny or likeable but because I can't say 'no,' like he gets off on that deviant shit. (Which maybe isn't fair of me to be thinking, since I'm the one who pulled him into the bedroom. But I can't help the way I feel right now, like I've just been used yet again.)

So it rankles, the so-called innocence of the suffering "virgins" in so many fanfictions, like Bella's stupid, and for that reason deserves whatever she gets. I'm not stupid. I know that it's my fault that people treat me the way that they do. I should just stand up for myself. But I don't, and it's not just because I'm weak, it's because I don't want to upset people, I don't want to do to them what people do to me (I don't want to use them), but everyone sees that as weakness, sees so-called innocence (kindness) as weakness, and they take that as a cue to do whatever the fuck they want to me. They should be the ones labelled, pilloried for their vulgar selfishness. Instead, I'm the one who gets the label.

Which is why, nonsensical as it is—and yeah, out of spite—I fantasize that for once it's the "virgin" who corrupts the whore, Bella who's corrupting Edward.

And by her corruption of him, I don't mean that this "virgin's" wielding some Bible-thumping moralizing, like there's something wrong with sex (the way the say there's something wrong with virginity nowadays). I mean like Claude McKay, knowing that a stripper doesn't really belong to the people who watch her strip. I mean like Emily Dickinson penning her virgin poems, because what did anyone really know about her 'Wild Nights'? I mean, like that line in _The Thunder, Perfect Mind,_ "I am the wife and the virgin." Distinctions arbitrary. As in Taoism, 'The hard and the easy define each other. _'_

And the fact that I'm thinking like this now is how I know that I'm still just myself. That I'll never be anything else. Sex with a cop doesn't change that.

Despite what V and J would say.

 **AN:**

 **I meant to surprise you with the cop and the protagonist falling into bed together, but have I swerved you too hard? I think my treatment is in keeping with the way "romance" is handled in noir writers like Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, but it might not be entirely credible for this Bella, given how cerebral she is.**

 **Would you like a POV for the detective? I wouldn't be surprised if some readers think he's taking advantage of his position right now, and I don't deny that his behavior's sketchy. Would you like to know what he's thinking?**

" **You don't see yourself clearly" is, I think, a direct quote from Meyers.**

 **The Claude McKay poem I'm referencing is** _ **The Harlem Dancer**_ **.**

 **So this chapter obviously shares some overlap with** _ **Corrupting Influence.**_ **J is based on a guy I actually knew, who actually said that he wanted to corrupt me. And these fanfictions are clearly me saying "f that patronizing bs." Thanks for putting up with me.**

Rec: Diamond in the rough _Hearts in Pain_ by Tess84 - AH. Bella Swan moves to the tiny town of Forks where she meets Edward Cullen, and the two fall in love. Their relationship is cut short when Edward moves from town - but he is leaving behind more than he could ever imagine... Rated: Fiction M - English - Romance/Drama - Bella, Edward - Chapters: 31 - Words: 162,899 - Reviews: 547 - Favs: 1,042 - Follows: 386 - Updated: Dec 25, 2009 - Published: Aug 20, 2009 - Status: Complete - id: 5317144


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12

 **Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

A week goes by. And every day, the detective calls to make sure that my brother and I are ok.

I wonder if he thinks that he has to check in on me to make sure that I'm not going to report him for misconduct or something. But why would I do that? For all I know, that would cost me my brother or get me arrested, and there's no way I'm taking either of those chances.

I've gone back to work. I drop my brother off at school every morning and in the afternoon he stays at a friend's house until I pick him up. He's going to have to change school systems eventually, but I'm putting that off for as long as possible because I know he'll raise hell.

I still haven't heard whether I passed my written Comps. I've seen my adviser in lecture every week but I'm afraid to ask him whether or not I passed.

Which is ridiculous. I'm an adult. Why can't I just act like it?

If I failed, then I failed. Delaying the news isn't going to make it any easier to hear.

I've met with that lawyer the the detective recommended and she says that my request for temporary custody is looking pretty good. She doesn't know what will happen in the long-term. My parents are still in jail because I refused to fork over the money for bail (I'm pretending that I don't have it). And there's a good chance that they'll each be doing a couple of months.

I know better than to count on that, but I'm trying not to let the panic get to me. It's not good for my brother.

It's Saturday again and I'm taking him to the movies. He's in the parking lot downstairs, getting in a few more minutes on his skateboard before we leave. I glance at him through the window while I'm grabbing my purse, only to see the detective pull up in a beat-up Ford.

The detective's in jeans and a t-shirt again, so I figure he isn't working. But I don't like him coming around like this.

I know that I still owe him, that's not the problem. I don't want that interfering with me spending time with my brother, though.

I'm waiting for him with the door open at the top of the stairs.

"Hey," he smiles, the first genuine smile that I think I've ever seen on his face.

"Hey," I reply, and I think that I've managed to make it sound welcoming, even though I'm not good at stuff like that.

I let him inside, at the same time saying that I'm heading out, so he doesn't get the idea that I have time for him, for this, now.

"You're going to the movies?" he asks.

"With my brother."

"What are you seeing?"

I shrug. "Some comic book movie."

"Let me take you."

"What?" I didn't expect this.

"Come on, it'll be my treat."

I'm about to say 'no,' but my brother's at the door and he apparently heard everything we said. "Cool," he says, as if he's actually looking forward to spending time with the detective. Like we're all friends or something.

I don't know how to get out of this, so I decide to just go along with it.

We take the detective's car— _Edward's_ car. He reminds my brother to call him "Edward," which I suppose sounds nicer than "the cop," which is how I'd been referring to the detective around my brother.

And my brother's got a clear case of hero worship going. He's asking all of these questions, like he might want to be a cop one day. I'll have to rectify that. No way is my brother going to become a cop, but I can let that slide until later.

For now, I sit back and listen to my brother ask Edward question after question. For instance, how long does it take a person to become a police officer? And has Edward ever shot anyone?

I try to cut that last one off. I don't want my brother talking about stuff like this, but Edward takes care of it. He says that he's never had to shoot anyone and he hopes that he never will.

The movie's not as bad as I expected, and Edward takes us to dinner at _Dave & Buster's_ for lunch. He and my brother play that Star Wars flier game and shoot hoops, looking for all the world like they're actually getting along.

Later, Edward tells me that he's not on the murder investigation anymore. We're back at my place. My brother is playing some video game and I'm in the kitchen with Edward, offering him a soda because it's all I've got besides coffee and tea.

I'm not sure that I understand what he's saying about the case. "Does that mean the police have given up? That it's a cold case now?"

"No, but I can't be on the investigation if I'm involved with you."

"Oh." I swallow hard because it's only just now occurred to me that he's told other people about the two of us.

He's started tapping his foot like he's nervous. "So I was wondering if you were free for dinner tomorrow."

"I've got my brother," I say, grateful for the excuse. "I need to spend time with him right now."

He looks disappointed for a minute—which is crazy—but then he shrugs. "Bring him with."

I'm annoyed that he's bringing my brother into this, whatever this is. I should tell him to fuck off—

But he's looking at me with this strangely hopeful expression that I never would've expected to see on his face. It reminds me of Dana Andrews when he woke up in Laura's apartment—

So I say 'sure' and he starts grinning like he just won one of those games at _Dave & Buster's._

And it makes something warm burst inside of me.

This is how it felt in the beginning with V and J, like it's not necessarily a bad thing that I'm going against my instincts and letting other people call the shots.

If history's really repeating itself, the sick empty feeling won't come until later.

In fairy tales, people make a virtue of grief. They tend rose gardens that hide castles and inside there's peace like the grave. Otherwise, they go mad, stumbling about and shouting until they realize that it _would_ be like magic to find a way through the tangling roses, to climb inside the castle and fall asleep. Because happiness is too much like poison, upsetting the heart and trampling the soul.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

My advisor finally got back to me about scheduling my oral defense, because apparently I _had_ passed the written Comps and he's surprised that no one told me (even though it's his job).

Unfortunately, my orals are a disaster. I'm so angry that I can't stop thinking about it, the committee members' words repeating again and again in my head on a loop.

I know that I'm overreacting. It's supposed to be a good thing when your committee gets into a fight with each other and ignores you completely but it's just—

It wouldn't be so bad if Dr. Y— hadn't been so fucking condescending, not even letting me finish speaking before he was cutting me off, cutting me off because apparently I'm a naïve little girl.

He wanted to know how I could possibly imagine that we have an accurate record of what people actually said about anything.

I was going to ask him if he was just making it up as he was going along then, telling students whatever he'd dreamt up that morning, and, if so, how that made him any different than Hitler, intentionally falsifying history to justify genocide.

But I didn't say anything—couldn't say anything—because I was cut off again.

 _Was there ever such a thing as Gnosticism,_ they wanted to know.

Of course there wasn't, I would have said, if they'd given me a chance. _Gnostic_ is just a label we use, because we need labels if we want to talk about things. We're stuck with words and imprecise, vulgar categories, but it's all we've got (until we work out that hive mind, of course).

And I know how problematic it is to talk about so-called heresies when all we've got to go on is the so-called orthodox propaganda of guys like Epiphanius, according to whom the Gnostics were sex-starved cannibals and sorcerers.

But we _do_ have some so-called Gnostic texts, so we _can_ say something about some of them, even if it isn't generalizable to the whole.

 _So what can we say?_

The words " _Corpus Hermeticum_ " were barely out of my mouth before I was cut off again. Because—didn't I know?— _Hermeticism_ was a Greco-Roman distortion of Egyptian thought, not Egyptian at all. And the hermeticists were elites living in Alexandria, not country peasants like the Gnostics.

I tried to interject, because not _all_ of the Gnostics were country peasants. They _couldn't_ have been, considering that Valentinus and Basilides were in Alexandria heading up their own so-call Gnostic schools.

And a very early demotic—that is _Egyptian_ —text of a hermetic text had recently been found. So the case for a purely Greco-Roman milieu for hermeticism was by no means air-tight.

And while Egyptian mortuary cult—the _Book of the Dead_ , mummification, all of it—was about transcendence of this world _after death_ , and both Gnosticism and Hermeticism were about transcendence of _this_ world (not merely after death, but during a person's actual lifetime), it was easy to see how the desire for one sort of transcendence could lead easily to a desire for the other. Because if you don't have to wait until your dead to do it, why not go now?

Unfortunately, I made the mistake of using the word "syncretism."

Didn't I know that no one used the word "syncretism" anymore? The new trend was to call everything "hybridity."

And I was going to point out that the intellectual heritage of the term "hybridity" was just as fraught with post-colonial baggage as the term "syncretism," but—

Not only was I apparently stupid, I was (I suppose) a racist, because I'd used the wrong word, because "syncretism" was an artifact of the inherently racist ideology popular in the 1950s.

And so on and so forth.

Yet the _pièce de résistance_ was when that fucker, my advisor, pulled out a photocopy of a papyrus from Oxyrhynchus.

"Do you know what this is?" he asked.

Was this a trick question? "A papyrus from Oxyrhnynchus," I said, because that was what it was. Or rather, a photocopy of a transcription from a papyrus, straight from Grenfell and Hunt's publication.

"It's the meeting minutes from a meeting of the _boule_ ," my advisor said.

Now it's true that I never know when my advisor's asking a rhetorical question, whether he wants me to actually say something or if he needs me to just sit there quietly while he lectures, but come on, this was my _fucking orals_. If I was ever going to talk, wasn't this the time?

"And here is a reference to the _strategus_. Do you know what the _strategus_ was?" he asked.

Did I know what the _strategus_ was? Did I know what the fucking _strategus_ was? He had to be setting me up. There was no fucking way that he thought that I was this fucking stupid. I answered with a questioning tone, the questioning part meaning _Are you fucking serious_ : "The town chief?" _Chief_ wasn't an exact equivalent for the term _strategus,_ of course, but it was a fair translation given that we don't really _have_ an exact equivalent in English.

"The _big man_ ," my advisor said, using an anthropological term that was also a fair translation, but was at least as problematic as "chief" and "syncretism."

I was going to fucking scream.

The round of patronizing questions continued until Dr. M interrupted (I think he knew that I was going to fucking scream), accusing my advisor of misconstruing the construction of the fifth century _boule_ in Egypt. For once I was grateful for the interruption, because I was about to lose my motherfucking shit, and I simmered quietly while they argued, Dr. M running down the clock so that by the time they were done, there wasn't enough time to ask me any more questions.

They sent me out in the hall while they discussed my performance.

And I was in hell, fucking hell out in that hall, waiting for them to call me back in. I'd heard that the department didn't let students get this far if they weren't going to pass, but still.

But still but still but still but still…

At last, they brought me back in and my advisor said that I'd passed.

Then that son-of-a-bitch said that they all agreed that I needed strengthening on the subject of Mithraism.

 _Fucking Mithraism?! Some cult that no one alive today even understands?_

My advisor said that I should make an effort to see him more often.

 _See him more often?!_

Go to his office so that he could talk to me about his fucking sailboat?!

 _Motherfucker!_

How could they possibly know whether or not I need strengthening in any areas when they wouldn't even let me talk?

I wished that they had failed me. I wished that I hadn't passed, because right now I feel like I've been given something that I don't deserve—like it was a _grudging_ pass—like I should feel _grateful_ when really I am just so fucking fucking fucking mad.

I suppose it's a good thing, then, that the detective's taking me out tonight. I probably shouldn't be around my brother when I'm in a mood like this.

But I probably shouldn't be around the detective either. I want to punch someone.

We go to a bar, and I decide, _What the fuck?_ I get a margarita and down it in one go.

I don't want my brother to see me drunk, but he's spending the night at a friend's.

"You were telling the truth," the detective— _Edward_ says—laughing at me.

"I always tell the truth," I say, which is a lie. I never tell the truth. I never tell people what I really think about them or about my Tulpa or—

"You don't drink."

I speak slowly for fear of slurring: "You've seen my mother. Would you drink if you were me?" I'm kind of pissed at him for not getting this. And kind of pissed because I'm still so pissed about school, which Edward doesn't understand at all ("You passed," he said. "Be happy."). And the fact that I'm letting my anger about school fuel my anger about Edward not understanding what it's like to have alcoholic parents is just pissing me off even more.

Or it would be. The truth is, I know that I should be pissed off, but the alcohol's dulling everything.

So I'm a little slow to figure out that he's looking over my head, at someone who's just come through the door.

"Who is it?" I ask, worried that my inebriation's turning him off. It's not fair—for once, I'm being like everyone else and Edward doesn't like it.

"No one," Edward says, finishing off his drink.

I can tell he's trying to avoid being seen though, the way he's ducking his head. And why should he want to disappear? Either someone's making him feel like shit (in which case I'm ready to tear them apart) or he's embarrassed to be seen with me (in which case I'm ready to tear _him_ apart).

"Edward?" a smooth female voice inquires from somewhere behind me, and turning around I find myself face-to-face with the kind of woman who Edward was probably meant to be with tonight. Pretty and sleek, with pink, shiny lipstick and a chic haircut.

"Lisa," Edward greets her in return as a brawny guy sidles up beside the newcomer.

"This is my boyfriend," she says, "Derrick."

 _Derrick_. Which I think must be code for _Dick_ , the way he's smirking at us.

"This is Isabella," Edward introduces me.

Derrick's dumbfounded. "Isabella and Edward? Isn't that like in a movie?"

 _It was a book first, but what-the-fuck-ever._

"Is this a joke?" Lisa snickers.

"Yes. We're dating as a joke," Edward says and I look at him, because I hadn't realized that we were dating, and he sounds kind of pissed.

"You wanna join us?" Derrick asks, gesturing towards a table where a few other Lisas and Derricks are already sitting.

"Sure," Edward answers, sounding like he'd rather get a root canal.

"Do you want to go home?" I whisper, because I could fake a seizure or something to get us out of here. And now that "we're dating," it looks like Lisa's the one I'm going to have to tear apart tonight.

"It's ok," Edward says, trying to sound nonchalant. But I call bullshit.

We join Lisa and Derrick and introductions go around the table. Despite my bravado, I'm such a lightweight that my anger's mostly a fizzly warmth as I concentrate on just maintaining. My mother's a mean drunk and I don't want to be like her. So I'll just keep my mouth shut and look like a good girlfriend, whatever that is.

"I've finally finished refurbishing that table. Isn't it cute?" One of Lisa's friends says, holding up her phone so that we can see a snapshot of an ugly tv stand. "Oh, and I just got this dish at the thrift shop too." She shows us a Facebook picture of someone eating dip out of an ugly orange ceramic bowl with hideous flowers. "Just two bucks. Real vintage."

I remember how my mother would blow whole paychecks at the Salvation Army, buying crap we didn't need. For want of room in the cabinets, she'd leave her purchases in the crawlspace under the trailer where it would sit in the dirt, a single layer of cheap plastic protecting it from the elements. My mother was sure that all was needed was some soap and water and it'd all be as good as new ( _You think you're too good to eat off this?_ ). So I knew my thrift shop merch.

For all this woman knew (Sandy, her name was _Sandy_ ), this bowl of dip with the hideous flowers was resurrected from under my mother's trailer (so what if a family of mice gave birth in it, no'll know). For all Sandy knew, her "vintage" bowl was once used to serve baby eyeball soup.

But I'm not going to let anything I'm thinking show on my face, because I'm fairly certain that Edward used to date Lisa and I don't want him to be any more uncomfortable than he already is.

Fortunately, no one's paying any attention to me, as per usual. The men are talking football and the women are now talking about something called "flea market chic," which sounds like a contradiction in terms, and "distressed furniture," which just sounds insane, like the trailer park where I grew up could rebrand itself as a furniture store and make mad bank.

Edward excuses himself to go to the bathroom and one of Lisa's friends leans over to me.

"Do you love him?" she asks in a low whisper.

I can't help it. I think of Plato's _Symposium._

 _Does Edward make me want to seek out greater and better versions of himself?_

"We've just started seeing each other," I tell her, not that it's any of her fucking business.

She tsks. "Is he still a cop?"

"Uh, yeah."

She hmphs.

And I can't help it, even though I know I shouldn't. "Why?"

"It's just, Lisa expected more from him."

More? As in, more like _Derrick_? Derrick, whose obsession with fantasy football is more than a little disturbing (at least I keep my fantasies to myself).

"Edward's a _detective_ ," I remind her, because come on, he isn't exactly a bum.

"Well at least he's not still moping around."

I can see the bait, but I'm not biting. Whatever Edward had going on with these people doesn't involve me. I'm not playing this bitch's game.

She's smirking at me though. "I thought he'd never get over Lisa. But he was just a little too _boring_ for her, if you know what I mean."

I know what she means. She thinks that _I_ look _boring._ With my nerd glasses and my little fitted suit (which I put on for my defense but kept on for work—where I did nothing but stew about my defense).

"Maybe Edward just didn't have the right kind of stimulation," I retort.

"Oh, I didn't mean anything by that," she says with mock sincerity.

 _What-the-fuck-ever_. I roll my eyes as Edward rejoins us at the table.

"You ok?" he wants to know, planting a kiss on my forehead, and I grab the front of his shirt and pull him down for a kiss on the lips.

"Just great," I tell him.

"It's getting late," he says, and I search his eyes to make sure that he really _is_ tired, that he's had a long day and that's all there is to it. "Do you want to get out of here?"

"Sure," I say, but I don't let go of his shirt while we stand up to say our goodbyes. And I tuck my head into his shoulder like I'm about to take a nap there.

The minute we turn from the table, I'm kissing him again, pushing him back towards the bathrooms, a chorus of whoops following us.

I realize that it's pretty slutty, what I'm doing, and the realization makes me happy, _happy_ because this is what a normal person would do when confronted with a bitchy ex-girlfriend and insinuations as to vanilla sex. I'm being normal for once.

I'm worried that Edward's going to try to stop me. He's a cop after all. But I suppose he's had it with his ex-girlfriend and the insinuations, because he lets me push him into the bathroom and he's the one who locks the door.

Needless to say I've never had sex in a public bathroom. It's so vulgar.

At the same time, it's vindicating, because who's the sweet little virgin now?

Fuck V and J. Fuck my advisor and the rest of my committee, thinking that they can just walk all over me. Fuck Lisa and Derrick and their friends who don't even know me. Fuck my parents for getting drunk and making me clean up their vomit all of those times. Fuck everyone.

Because maybe the world really is just an illusion, but maybe I'm one of those Gnostics who embraces the illusion, indulging in lust and excess and anger, if only for five minutes, drunk and fucking in the bathroom of a bar.

 **AN:**

 **Rec: Diamond in the rough:** _ **Play Dates**_ **by SarahCullen17 -** Bella is a single mother of a five-year-old son, Emerson. Edward is a single father of a five-year-old daughter, Emmy. They've given up on finding love for a very long time until their children become playground buddies. Nominated for a TwiFiction Award! Rated: Fiction T - English - Romance/Family - Bella, Edward - Chapters: 19 - Words: 63,684 - Reviews: 792 - Favs: 920 - Follows: 385 - Updated: Jan 11, 2011 - Published: Nov 25, 2010 - Status: Complete - id: 6502829


	13. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

My father has been sentenced to three months in jail.

My mother would have been out by now but she apparently got into a fight with another inmate, so she has to stay in for at least two more months.

My lawyer says that I'll have an uphill battle keeping custody of my brother once they get out. And knowing my parents, they'll be so pissed that I wouldn't bail them out or pay for their lawyers that they'll refuse to let me see him.

But there's nothing I can do about that right now, and I haven't got time to wallow, so I do what I always do and pretend it's not happening.

I also spend as much time as possible with my brother. Among other things, I discover that he's been reading philosophy. It's all modern stuff like Spinoza and Wittgenstein, so I don't understand a word he says, but that's ok, even if he does say things like "NeoPlatonism's soft-philosophy" and "Plato never satisfactorily grappled with the problems facing the serious thinker." I'm beginning to suspect that he's secretly an Aristotelian, which is crazy, because everyone knows that Aristotle's _Ideas_ are just Plato's _Forms_ , and anyone could come up with the Categories. But my brother's only thirteen, so I'm going to let him slide for a while.

Turns out that my brother moving in is all of the motivation I need to finish unpacking. All of my books are put away, and I've finally unpacked my Vettriano prints, which are really just whatever I could print in black-and-white from the websites where they sell his work. I've got 'em stuck to the refrigerator with magnets. But that fancy print of Otto Preminger's _Laura_ is buried in my closet where Edward won't find it unless he goes snooping. I don't want Edward realizing my obsession with a movie starring a cop that reminds me of him.

Besides, Edward doesn't like noir. He's a cop in real life so I suppose that makes sense.

He likes kung-fu and samurai films, many of which are actually film noir (with better action scenes) but I don't tell him that. (Nor have I pointed out his hypocrisy in questioning my interest in Buddhism when he's obviously got a crush on Jet Li and Toshiro Mifune. I've decided that he was just baiting me with all of that talk, playing bad cop.)

I have pointed out, however, how that the back of every one of Edward's DVDs reads the same: All about so-and-so fighting for his life when he's got no life left to fight for.

"Why bother?" I ask Edward, as the anti-hero on screen hacks his way through the ranks of the Yakuza who've killed the anti-hero's entire family. "If he's got nothing left to fight for, why's he fighting?"

"It's what he does," Edward shrugs (as if he's an Existentialist and doesn't even know it).

"Why not just give up?" _Why add to the wreckage?_

"Because he's not afraid to die anymore," Edward explains.

I figure it's like a koan, this fighting that the anti-heroes do in these movies. You can't understand the koan or win the fight until you give up.

But I can't help feeling that winning's got to be kind of a letdown after a person quits trying. A real kick in the teeth.

And I wonder if enlightenment's the same way. Like maybe you get there and figure it's not worth it.

Turning away from the screen, I remind my brother that we're a family of pacifists and we don't believe in violence.

He doesn't tell me to fuck off. But I can see it in his eyes. He's remembering all of the violence that our parents would do without laying a single finger on either us.

Edward pipes in to tell my brother that fighting settles nothing, acting like he's all for non-violence despite being a cop.

While I appreciate the support, I wish Edward would stay out of it. I'm already worried about how much my brother looks up to Edward. This isn't going to last, after all, Edward and me, I mean.

Even if there wasn't an expiration date on this "romance," I wouldn't want my brother falling for the idea that cops really have our backs. I make sure that he knows everything that's going on in the news, the militarization of the police force and the entrenching of the blue wall, cops who say that they took the job because they "wanted to help people" when really it was because they wanted to be a "big man" and wield violence with impunity.

Every time another cop is acquitted for killing an unarmed black man or child, my brother tells me that Edward isn't like that. I don't say otherwise, because _What do I know? I've never seen Edward take a nightstick to anyone_ , but it hasn't escaped my notice that my brother's got more faith in the man I'm having sex with than I do.

I know it's fucked up to be thinking things like this, but I don't want to be like those women who end with microphones in their face, someone asking them how they could possibly love a monster.

Not that I've said anything to Edward about this. I don't ask him what he thinks about cops covering for cops, or cops taking bribes, or cops who don't bother to identify themselves before they shoot kids on playgrounds. I figure there's no point in asking—we'll be over soon enough. He'll get tired of me and go. And if I'm right about cops, right about him, then telling him my fears will just land me in jail or, worse yet, make me lose custody of my brother.

These are the kinds of things I think about when I lay awake in the middle of the night, unable to sleep and sick with anxiety. These are the kinds of things I think about when Edward's not around.

When he _is_ around, my worries go away, because he's just so fucking nice. So nice it's annoying. I wish he'd be mean to me so that I wouldn't have to feel so guilty for being so suspicious of him.

He's so nice, in fact, that I would think that it's all in my head, that I'm overreacting, except that it was the same way with V and J. It was only when we were apart that I'd see the two of them clearly, that I'd realize just what they were doing to me. I'd promise myself that I'd get some distance, I'd stop letting them tell me what to do. But when we saw each other again, I'd be so fucking happy just being there with them—like they were my drug—that I'd renege on every one of those promises to myself.

I'm afraid that I'm doing the same thing all over again.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Edward and I have been dating for a couple of weeks now. He plays video games with my brother and takes me on dates. I've even had dinner with a few of Edward's friends—his real friends, that is, not ex-girlfriends with their entourages—and he's asked me to introduce him to my friends.

I tell him that I haven't got any. That I've been too busy with my family and school and work to socialize, but I don't think that he believes me. Which is to say, he knows that I'm hiding something from him, but he's holding out hope that it's actual people that I'm hiding (like all of my friends are stoners or illegal immigrants and I'm afraid to introduce them to a cop). What I'm hiding, of course, is psychosis, because Edward still doesn't know about the daydreaming or the fanfiction.

It's bad enough that he's read my journals. I remember how it felt, walking into my apartment and finding him there, my mother passed out in the bedroom. Thanks to her, Edward got to read things that I never meant for anyone else to know. He didn't have time to get very far into the journals, but still, he must know just how broken I am.

We haven't talked about it. I've boxed up all of the journals and stuck them in my closet. He'll stay out of there if he knows what's good for them. People nowadays have got no respect for privacy.

I don't want him asking me questions, either. V and J were always asking me questions. It's not like I go prying into Edward's life. I ask him how his day was and if he doesn't want to talk about it, I don't push him. Everyone says that talking makes things better when really it does the opposite. It gives life to things that would otherwise remain dormant. Dangerous things.

Case in point: Querying Edward's stance on philosophical quandaries is a mistake.

"How do you know you're not just a brain in a vat?" I ask him.

"What?"

Maybe now isn't the best time to ask him a question like this. We're lying in bed at his place and we've just had sex and Edward's half-asleep. But Epiphanius said that the Gnostics used sex to find salvation, and Tantric Buddhists supposedly have a similar thing going on, so I figure why not, maybe orgasms really do stimulate higher thinking. I ask him again. "How do you know that you're not just a brain in a vat?"

"Like in _The Matrix_?"

I huff, but I don't say what I'm thinking, because it's not his fault that _The Matrix_ completely misrepresents Platonism. " _The Matrix_ , whatever. How do you know that you're really you? Here? In this body?"

"Are you serious?" he asks, clearly confused, and not just because he's half-asleep.

I don't reply, because I am serious, but I shouldn't have asked this now, not like this.

"I just know," he says, having decided, I guess, that I wouldn't let him sleep until he answered.

"Just like that?"

"Yep."

"But how do you know that you're not dreaming?"

"I can tell the difference between a dream and reality." He sounds so sure of himself.

I won't push him on this. If he says that he can tell the difference, then who am I to doubt him? What holds true for me might not hold true for him.

"You really can't tell?" he asks, rolling over to look at me, fully awake now.

"Zuangzhi said _'Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man.'_ "

"You think you're a butterfly?"

"The best dream-sex I ever had was with a butterfly."

He starts sputtering, and I realize how that just sounded.

I clarify. "It wasn't really a butterfly. It was like an alien, but pretty, and human-sized, like from that movie _The Abyss_."

He's stopped sputtering, but I think that he thinks that I'm pulling his leg. "You have a thing for butterflies?" he asks in a slow, calm voice.

"I _hate_ butterflies." I'm not into bestiality—or insectality. "They remind me of those paper fairies the Cottingley girls were messing with. Creepy bitches." I shudder. "But it _was_ good sex." I'm thinking about that dream with the butterfly-alien again, which my mother would probably say was evidence of alien abduction, but I've never told her about it.

"Are you asleep right now?" Edward asks and for a minute I think that he's got it, that he understands.

I sit up. "That's just it! How do I know? You're not supposed to be able to read when you're asleep, but I can." I see words in my dreams, even though psychologists say that you're not supposed to be able to do that, and that your inability to do so is one of the ways that you can tell a dream from reality. "And they say that no one ever wonders if they're really asleep when they're actually awake, but sometimes I do." Sometimes I'm walking down the street and everything feels fuzzy, not even because I'm sick or because I've taken cold medicine, but just because the sun is so bright that it's making everything hazy and there's such a cacophony of noise from the city and I think, _I could be asleep right now_. "Sometimes I'm awake and I wonder to myself if I'm really asleep."

I pause, because I'm so excited that at long last I've found someone who understands, and I'm waiting for him to say so. But he's just looking at me. I can see his face in the glow of the street lights through the curtains.

"Doesn't that ever happen to you?" I ask.

"No."

"Oh."

I don't know what else to say. Like he's admitted that he believes life was actually better before they started putting Vitamin D in milk for little kids who don't get enough sunlight.

Then I figure that I should try to explain. "The Gnostics said that sleep was ignorance, but what if we're really awake when we're asleep? And how're we supposed to find salvation if we're not concentrating on the right part? I mean, we're always praying and meditating and doing good deeds when we're awake, but what if we're supposed to be doing all of that stuff when we're asleep, because that's where it really counts?"

"I don't think that's how it works."

"How would we know?"

"We just would."

And I can tell that he means it. That he really thinks it's that simple.

So I decide to pretend that that's enough for me, too, for now, and I lay back down as he settles against his pillows. But as I turn over, I can't help but wonder how I can be with someone who never worries about this. Someone who just takes it for granted that he's real and that I'm real and that the universe is real. Someone who, apparently, has never performed any tests to confirm his beliefs.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"Is it because he took something that belongs to you?" I ask, because I'm trying to understand. Really trying. "You buy food for us all of the time."

"Are you kidding me?" Edward asks. "Your parents are alcoholics. Do you really think that your thirteen year old brother should be drinking?"

No. I don't. But is it really for me to say? My brother has to make his own decisions in life.

I'm pretty sure that's the wrong answer, though, and Edward is looking at me like I'm a bad parent.

We're at Edward's apartment, and he's just caught my brother drinking a beer. And Edward's mad at me because I'm _not_ mad.

"Is it because he's only thirteen?" I ask, trying to get a hint.

"Fuck yeah." I've never seen Edward this angry before.

"So if he was older, that would be okay?" I'm not being intentionally obtuse. I want to understand the problem.

Edward takes a deep breath and I can see he's trying to reign in his temper. "How is it possible that you don't understand this? Of anyone, I would think that _you_ would understand this."

"It's not for me to tell other people what to do."

He gapes at me. "You're his fucking guardian. It _is_ your job to tell him what to do."

That's not how my brother and I work. We talk and come to a compromise that works for the both of us.

I mean, my brother reads Spinoza for God's sake; he's certainly smart enough to make a decision for himself.

"How old would he have to be then?" I ask.

Part of me wonders if we're only having this fight because there's something missing inside of me, that I'm just supposed to know all of this stuff already, instinctually. But another part of me knows that morality's culturally relative. If this were fifth century BCE Athens, my brother would already be drinking and have an older male lover, and I'd be illiterate and wrapped up in the ancient Greek equivalent of a burkah.

Besides, don't thirteen year olds nowadays drink beer?

 _I_ didn't, of course, but _normal_ thirteen year olds do. Why shouldn't my brother be normal?

"The legal drinking age is twenty-one," Edward says.

Then I remember that Edward's a cop and that aggravates the shit out of me. "Twenty-one? He's probably already old enough to get a girl pregnant. He can enlist in the military and _die_ for our country at the age of eighteen but he has to wait until he's twenty-one to drink?" I can't believe Edward's being so fucking stupid. "He can buy cigarettes and vote an idiot into the most powerful position in the world at the age of eighteen but he has to wait until twenty-one to drink?" This makes no sense to me at all. It's not as if something magical happens at the age of twenty-one. Nothing happened to me after all. Nothing at all. I didn't have a party. I didn't even go out drinking.

"That's the law."

I can't fucking believe he thinks it's that fucking simple. Like we're all robots.

"The _law_? Who cares about the law? I've shoplifted," I tell him. "You want to arrest me?"

"You _shoplift_?" If he was angry before, that was nothing compared to this.

But I remember that he's had sex in a public bathroom and I'm pretty sure that's illegal too.

"Shoplift _ed._ Past tense. But I've done it." I say it self-righteously, too, like I can break this bad habit of _not_ shoplifting any time I want. Go back to my anarchist ways at the drop of a hat.

He throws up his hands. "Why'd you stop? Why don't you go out shoplifting with your brother right now?" He snorts. "Hell, pick up some meth on the way."

"Ok, now you're blowing this out of proportion."

"So there _is_ a limit? Thank God! Why stop at meth, though? Why there? Isn't that a little arbitrary of you?"

And I see that he has a point. But that only means that I'm a hypocrite. Not that I'm wrong.

I imagine my brother's face on a bonsai bush and the clippers in my hand.

"He's his own person," I say. "I can't tell him what to do."

"He's thirteen. And you're going to lose custody."

That stops me in my tracks. "I don't want to lose custody."

"Could have fooled me."

"I'm not going to lose custody. Everything I've done—everything I'm _doing—_ is to keep custody."

He's got his arms crossed and his cop face on. "You know the court could petition me. They could ask my opinion. And up until now, I'd only have good things to say."

I gape at him. "You can't say anything that might hurt my case."

"I wouldn't have a choice."

"Of course you'd have a choice." Hasn't he read any fucking Sartre? "What the fuck do you think I'm having sex with you for?"

 **AN:**

 **My brother wasn't reading Spinoza and Wittgenstein at the age of thirteen, but he** _ **was**_ **reading Zhuangzhi, Lao Tzu and Confucius, so I hope this isn't completely unbelievable.**

 **For an excellent American take on the mash-up of film noir and samurai films, I highly recommend Forrest Whittaker's movie** _ **Ghost-Dog: Way of the Samurai.**_

 **Also, the greatest action sequence of all time, ever, in the history of movies, is the ending of** _ **City of Violence.**_ **Yes, there are more iconic scenes. But for sheer variety, choreography and thoroughness,** _ **City of Violence**_ **wins.**

 **Rec: Diamond in the rough:** _ **Baby Whisperer**_ **by compass54** She manipulated me so easily. Twenty-one, beautiful and curious is a perilous mix. Olderward. Jazz music. He's a successful classical pianist who doesn't believe in marriage. She's still in college. They meet at his manager's wedding and he doesn't stand a chance. Host's Choice and Judge's Choice in the May to December Romance Contest. Rated: Fiction M - English - Romance/Family - Chapters: 10 - Words: 71,780 - Reviews: 897 - Favs: 946 - Follows: 749 - Updated: Nov 4, 2015 - Published: Feb 13, 2015 - Status: Complete - id: 11041772


	14. Chapter 14

**Disclaimer: Characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

When you tell a person that you're only sleeping with him because he's helping you keep custody of your brother, I figure it can go one of two ways.

Presumably you're on the same page. He knows that's why you're sleeping with him. He'd have to be pretty stupid not to, especially if he's a cop.

Alternatively, and this one's a long shot, he really is that stupid. He's really fooled himself into thinking that the two of you just happened to fall into each other's arms, like kismet.

But there's no such thing as kismet. No such thing as fate (except maybe the evil archons that, according to the Gnostics, are trying to chain us to this world). We've got free will and choices and it only makes sense that a guy like Edward—a _normal_ guy, even if he is a cop—is with someone like me because he gets off on the fact that I can't say 'no.'

Because I'm utterly forgettable. I'm not clever or funny or kind. I'm just me. I'm not enchanting. I'm not the kind of woman a good cop, a good man, falls for.

And that pisses me off. "Do you honestly expect me to believe that you just couldn't help yourself? That you were so enamored of a piece of trailer trash like me that you were willing to throw caution to the wind? Please," I scoff. "I know what you think of me."

Edward's wearing this face like he's shocked. "You're not trailer trash."

"No, I'm just crazy. I see things that aren't there, isn't that what you said?" I remember Edward telling me that he didn't think that I saw anyone in that parking garage. "I make shit up to get attention. I'm lonely. I'm the perfect prey."

"Prey?"

"Vulnerable and needy. And who the fuck am I going to complain to when some cop hits on me?"

"Is that what—"

"Why the fuck else would you be with me? I don't exactly look like 'cop girlfriend' material."

"That's why. Because you aren't. Because you haven't got anything to do with that world. Because maybe I want to forget about all of the sleazy, fucked up shit I see all day long."

I open my mouth to tell him that I'm not buying what he's selling, because I've got 'sleazy, fucked up shit" written all over me, but then I remember the fact that Edward's introduced me to his friends. That he's taken me on dates. I'm not just some dirty little secret.

"I can't believe you," he says. "You think that I—" He looks sick just imagining it. "Do you know what that makes me?"

A john. A dirty cop. A pig.

"Do you know what that makes _you_?" he's snarling now.

A whore. Because wanting things, the way I want to keep my brother safe, it chains a person to this world. Makes hookers of us all. Like the Zen master said.

"Is that really all you think of me?" he wants to know, the anger drained from his voice.

I'm crying now, silently, thank God, because I haven't got a right to cry, a right to complain about where this is going.

He clenches his jaw, and I can see he's made a decision. "You're right about one thing though." I wait for it. The bullet to the cerebellum. "You can't afford to look crazy right now. _Memoirs to Prove the Non-Existence of the World_?"

Fuck. He knows about that.

He keeps going. "You can't let people see shit like that. You can't talk like that. Or you _will_ lose custody."

He's done, or so I think. And we're at his place, too, my brother sitting in the kitchen while we're having this argument in Edward's bedroom, so I have to be the one to go. And quickly. I don't want to be here another minute longer.

I turn to leave, but it turns out Edward wasn't done after all. "I would've thought your brother would be enough," he says. "If not me, then your brother would've been enough to make the world worth living in. To make it _real_."

 _Fuck him_. Fuck him for saying something like that. Like it's an act of spite on my part. Like saying that maybe the world isn't real is an assault on everything in it. As if I _want_ my brother to disappear.

Maybe it's a good thing he said it, though, because Edward's made me so angry that I'm not crying any more when I collect my brother from the kitchen and tell him we're going.

I ignore my brother's questions—tell him it doesn't matter—and we're leaving.

My brother's hanging back on the stairs, asking if it's his fault that we have to go and whether I've broken up with Edward and I just keep repeating that it doesn't matter. Then I have to tell him just to be quiet, to shut his mouth, because I need to calm down so that I can drive us back to my apartment, and I'm a good guardian, goddammit, I'm not going to do anything reckless with my brother in the car.

He starts in with the questions again as soon as we get home. "Leave me alone," I say. "I respect your privacy, so respect mine."

I lie down on my bed and think.

 _It's better this way_ , I tell myself. I've been acting like being with Edward doesn't mean anything—like it's just a thing I'm doing, with no implications for my belief in the existence of the world or my support for the growth of the police state—but that's not true. There's no such thing as neutrality.

Besides, the best birth control in the world fails sometimes. Am I really willing to commit another life to the karmic cycle of life and death? Most days, I don't even know which way is up. And you shouldn't have a kid unless you're ready to impart your wisdom so he or she knows how to make it in this world. My parents didn't teach me crap and I don't want to be like them.

Not that I don't think about it sometimes. Fanfictions about pregnant Bellas are the best, really, for angst, because it's so much worse when there's a child involved. Of course, the argument over Bella keeping the baby in _Breaking Dawn_ is just a variation of Edward bailing in _New Moon_ , so the best _AH_ 's combine the two, making Edward leave her when she finds out she's pregnant.

If I were writing the story, Edward would be a CEO-to-be, a real up and comer at the business founded by his granddaddy, Esme's father. By all rights, Edward shouldn't have anything at all to do with Bella, who's working as a waitress down at the diner to put herself through school. They're all wrong for each other, whatever way you look at it, because she's a hippy, free spirit, and he's all pinstripes and boardrooms. But maybe that's why they fit so well together, because they take each other's problems and put them in a box, then throw the box away. (The way that _my_ Edward said he wanted a girlfriend to do.) When Edward's grandfather dies, Edward steps into the role of CEO. That doesn't necessarily mean that he has to end it with Bella, though. Why should he? She's got another year of college, but there's no reason they can't do long distance. Except that Edward's surrounded by sycophants and liars, all of them scrambling to get a piece of him, and they drive Edward and Bella apart. Missed phone calls and undelivered messages. Subterfuge and outright deception.

So it's over. They're through, until Bella realizes she's pregnant.

I'm not a modern woman. Which is to say that I don't think fathers are good for very much. I don't think Bella's got any obligation to tell Edward about the baby at all. There're much worse things than growing up without a father.

Like growing up _with_ one.

But Bella tells him (she has to in order for the plot to work). She's afraid to give him the news because she doesn't want her baby to be anything like the person Edward's become—a person whose selfish and cruel, concerned only with money and appearances—but she ends up sending Edward a picture of the sonogram, because part of her still loves him, still thinks there's a part of him not entirely driven by the need to increase his profit margin.

But he's been surrounded by those sycophants and liars for too long. Edward's decided that the Bella he once loved never existed. That it was just a con and that this sonogram of hers is another con.

"It's not mine," he says, the words like a knife in her chest, because she can hear what he's really saying, that she's a whore and a deceiver.

Edward's lawyer, Caius, starts in then. Says that Edward wants a DNA test and doesn't want to wait until the baby's born. Bella refuses, because it's risky for the baby (doesn't Edward know that?). When Caius won't take 'no' for an answer, she goes to Edward's offices, to confront him to his face.

Edward didn't know that there was a risk to the fetus. He wouldn't hurt a baby, whatever the reason. He promises Bella that he'll fix it.

He does too. He tells Caius to back off on the DNA test. In fact, seeing Bella's caused Edward to have a complete change of heart. Edward tells Caius that, instead of severing his paternal rights, he wants to exercise him. Edward wants to see that kid as much as he can, every damn day if he can.

Edward doesn't tell Caius everything; What Edward he really wants is Bella and the kid, together, both of them. Because, yeah, seeing Bella reminded Edward how much he loved her.

Caius, not knowing that, does what Caius always does. He goes balls-to-the-wall. He starts sending Bella letters of intent, threatening all sorts of legal action if she doesn't sign over her rights to the baby once it's born. Caius says Edward wants full custody.

Caius isn't playing around either. He's calling Bella every day and sending aides to her door with papers for her to sign.

It's more than Bella can take. She's going to school full time and working and pregnant, and it's not an easy pregnancy. She's not supposed to have stress, and she's already scared enough as it is just worrying whether she'll be a good mother.

And now here're these lawyers telling her that she's unfit just because she hasn't got two pennies to rub together.

It's enough to put her in the hospital.

By this point, Caius has a private investigator watching Bella to dig up dirt, so he knows all about the hospitalization and he tells Edward.

Naturally, Edward panics. He rushes to the hospital, desperate to see Bella.

But she doesn't want to see him.

"I don't want to see you," she says when he walks into her room.

"Please," he says, "please."

Bella doesn't even have a chance to reply before a nurse walks in saying that she's there to get Bella ready for her D & C.

 _D & C_.

Bella knows what that is. It's the procedure they perform to remove non-viable fetuses.

Which is how Bella finds out that her baby's dead.

And Bella curls up on the hospital bed screaming "Get out get out get out get out."

She screams and screams and screams until Edward at last listens, until he does the right thing for once and gets the hell out of her room.

And it's his fault. He killed her baby, him and his lawyer and his company and his family.

But it's all a horrible mistake. Of course, it's a mistake. The nurse was wrong. She'd walked into the wrong room. She'd made an awful, awful mistake and Bella's baby is ok, it's going to be ok.

As long as Edward stays out of Bella's life.

Or so Bella reasons.

By this point, Edward's long gone. Off drowning his sorrows in a bottle, and he's going to stay there—at the bottom of a bottle—for a while.

Bella gets out of the hospital and goes home.

She ignores all of the messages from Edward—there are quite a few—and she muddles through the rest of her pregnancy, barely making ends meet because she's cutting back on her hours at the diner.

The pregnancy isn't getting any easier, but she makes it.

Now, for the next part of the story, I need Edward to find out that the baby's still alive. I don't know, an accidental sighting or something. Regardless, Edward finds out that the baby is still alive. He shows up at the hospital after the delivery.

"It's not yours," Bella says.

And it's true, in a way. Bella listed the father as unknown on the birth certificate.

But the baby's got that red hair, the ubiquitous red hair (thank God Meyers gave Edward a distinctive characteristic like that), and there's no denying it.

Edward says that it was all Caius' fault, that he's fired Caius and that Bella doesn't have to worry that someone's going to try to take her baby away from her. But why should Bella believe a word that Edward says? He's a liar and a monster and if she lets him into her baby's life, her baby's going to grow up just like him.

But at least her baby will be alive. Her baby will have food and a good education and a safe place to live.

After all, Bella needs help. She's out of work and she's still a few credits shy of graduation. She can barely afford to feed herself.

Not to mention the fact that Bella doesn't know what she's doing with a baby.

She's afraid it's only a matter of time before the truth comes out and everyone sees just how terrible she is at mothering.

Now I only read HEAs, so as bad as it seems now, with Bella suffering the full-effects of PTSD, there'll be some bullshit reunion, after which Edward rediscovers his humanity and Bella gets treatment for postpartum depression and finishes college.

If this were a true story, Bella would kill herself and Edward would raise their baby to be a soul-less succubus while he drowns himself in cocaine and whores. But I suppose that I'm prejudiced.

Because I think of my parents and how I grew up and I just want to—

Mothers aren't worth much more than fathers. Some of them are even worse, always trying to get revenge for the fact that they had to let a baby grow inside of them, like a parasite.

Hypothetically, let's just say that that the world does in fact exist and that everything in it is real, and that having a kid doesn't mean condemning another soul to the suffering that's inherent to an inhabitant of Maya, even if all of that were true, I would still probably be one of those horrible mothers who begrudge their offspring's existence.

I wouldn't _want_ to be. But I would. I'd be just like my mother. I know it.

Which was Edward's point, I suppose. (I mean the _real_ Edward, or at least the real-er Edward, the cop.)

I'm a terrible guardian to my brother.

But I'm still the best that my brother's got. And I'm doing a damn sight better by him than my own parents.

Part of me is scared that Edward'll do something to fuck up my custody, but he's not vindictive like that.

So when it comes to moving forward, it's really just a matter of me forgetting that I was ever dating him.

 _Just get over him_ , I tell myself.

As if it's as easy as that.

As if it doesn't feel like I've got a hole in my chest.

It's just more proof, I suppose, that there's something wrong with me. Because why is it that people can crawl inside of me so easily, can make a nest for themselves inside of me, like they're a part of me, so that when they go it feels like they've taken part of me too?

 _An empty bowl_. I'm an empty bowl, like that book of Vedic astrology said, and people just fill me right up. Without them I'm nothing.

And not _nothing_ in a good way. Not _nothing_ like everything's free and clear.

No, I'm _nothing_ like I'm so low I might never get up again.

Which reminds me of V and J, naturally.

I'm right back there again. Like I've made all of the same mistakes all over again. And my heart's broken all over again.

Except this time it really _is_ my fault.

And because it's not enough just to think about V and J, to remember what they did to me, I go to my closet and pull out those boxes with my old journals, all of them written in that juvenile scrawl of mine, my handwriting always reminding me of Norma Desmond's (because I'm a megalomaniac and a child).

I open one of the journals at random and see a reference to "the interval."

I'd forgotten about that. How, before we started planning our vacation, J and I had stopped speaking to V for a month. A solid month. Afterwards, we called it "the interval."

Every indication at the time was that it was my fault, that I'd started it, or so I thought. Only to find out a week after it was resolved that V had engineered the whole thing. She said it was because she was angry at him. _Distant_ , she said, _he's distant_.

In a friendship like ours, distance wasn't permitted.

And all of it was on their schedule. When we stopped talking to each other, it was because J said so. When I wanted to reconcile with V, J said that I couldn't. Then later he said that I _had_ to talk to her, even though I'd changed my mind.

Then she said I shouldn't have lunch with him as punishment for his coldness, his problems, when she was nothing herself but a frigid fish.

I thought I was being loyal.

When it was finally over, and we'd all reconciled, she wanted us to go on vacation.

 _No_ , I thought, feeling the same sense of dread that set in when she first suggested that I move into the empty desk in her office.

 _No._

Even before I had finished framing my refusal— _I'm not sure a vacation_ —she had snapped "Why not?"

And what could I say? What rational reason could I possibly give for not wanting to go on vacation with them? Weren't they my friends? Didn't they want me to come? Didn't I want to be wanted?

I said alright.

Where would we go?

J said Amsterdam, no doubt thinking that this was a prime opportunity for my corruption.

I wasn't interested—I don't smoke weed and I hate tulips—but they said that we could stop over in Paris. They knew that I wanted to see the catacombs. So I said yes.

Then they said that if I wanted to go to Paris, I should do the research. I should call for rates and compare itineraries.

And I did. I put together maps and schedules and budget plans. I figured out which trains we should take and got a list of all of the youth hostels. I planned walks over bridges and waterways and even made room for tulips, the riot of colors, with hashish bars for J. There were museums and art and not even V could object to such beauty.

I knew that the trip didn't mean as much to V and J as it did to me. V had come to the USA all of the way from India and J had travelled through Europe with his family as a child. But I'd grown up in a trailer park and I'd never been outside of the country.

To me, our trip meant the world. It was so much, in fact, that I was ignoring that it meant that I'd be spending even more time with the two of them.

But we didn't go to Europe at all.

My reaction to their decision made no sense. I know that.

I am well aware that I overreacted. I know that it makes me sound like a bratty child.

I remember crying, even though I never cry. I remember sobbing so hard that my supervisor didn't question me when I told her that I had to go home early.

I cried so hard that when management wanted to reprimand us for the length of our customary lunches, they yelled at V and J, and left me out of it entirely, because management thought that my grandmother had died (or something) and they didn't want to upset me.

Fucking management cared more about me than my two dearest friends.

A terrible sadness came over me when they told me their decision. And it wasn't just the way I was "told" about the change in our plans, like mommy and daddy were informing me that I was being sent off to boarding school, even though I realize now that V and J must have had it all planned, because they didn't even have to discuss it. V just said "We're going to an island" and J nodded.

 _No,_ I thought. I had visions of Papillon. A prison and a hell.

I said: "I do not care for the Caribbean." They didn't know how I sometimes think about going away to the desert, how I think about going there and leaving my car and wandering until I'm dead. But they knew that I hate the summer. That I despise the heat. How the nausea kicks in whenever the temperature neared eighty. How the sunlight fucking _hurts_.

It didn't matter. They'd already made up their minds.

I tried again. "I want to go to Paris." The cemeteries, the sewers.

But it was already decided. Why make a fuss?

I tried to envision the vacation they wanted: The white sand like little shards of glass and the heat a furnace and the brilliance of the sun stabbing at my skin. I saw a scalding stretch of sand and the awful sun above with no trees at all, everything so baldly exposed, so cruelly, with no shade and no place to hide and at least the desert where I'll go to die will be empty—there'll be no other people in that inferno wasteland.

The breath just went out of me, my eyes already smarting from the light, my skin aching from the burn.

They could have said an artic wasteland and it wouldn't have hurt so much. They said: "An island," and I felt just as if I were dying. I said "I can't."

"Why not?" V asked, angry already.

I never wanted to go anywhere with them in the first place. Never even wanted to go on vacation with them.

"Why not?" V demanded again, exasperated and frustrated and annoyed and fuming, just fuming, already.

If I'd said to her: "Antarctica, glacier exploring," she'd have understood. She'd have been just as put off. But no, she couldn't see my side. Couldn't imagine that there was any way of seeing the world that differed from hers.

J said: "Tell us why not," but then he dismissed every single fucking thing I had to say.

And I was filled with a great and crushing sadness.

So I went home crying—no, _sobbing._

Something so minor shouldn't have had the power to affect me so seriously. But it wasn't just their decision to go to an island, was it? It wasn't just a fucking vacation, was it?

Maybe I'm fucked up. Maybe I'm the only person in the world who would rather go to Siberia than the Caribbean, and this is evidence of a deep and abiding pathology. So what? Don't I have the right to be different? Don't I have the right to say 'no'?

No, I don't have the right to say 'no.' Not with V always picking picking picking until I agreed to whatever she and J wanted me to do. _Why don't you want to have lunch with us?_ Because I want to be alone. _Why don't you want you to go out tonight?_ Because I want to be alone. _Why don't you want to go out this weekend?_ Because I want to be alone. _Why haven't you applied for graduate school?_ Because I'm a fuck up. _Why don't you want to get an apartment with us?_ Because I'm a fuck up. _Why don't you — Why don't you — Why don't you — Why don't you — Why don't you — Why don't you —_

In the end, I said: "I haven't got anything left to say," and they said I was a child.

I ought to have broken it off then and there. I ought never to have gotten on a plane with them. But I didn't want to be lonely.

So I went back to them, and pretended like my heart wasn't broken. Management yelled at V and J for the fact that we took two hour lunches, and I secretly gloated, so very very very pleased that I had an excuse to get away from them.

Otherwise, nothing had changed. I remember how we spent the following Saturday in F— P—, wandering through used record stores and vintage boutiques. And I remember laughing, despite everything, despite the fact that we'd just bought our plane tickets. I made myself believe that it was alright that we were going to the Caribbean instead of Europe. Because I was just so happy after all of the fighting we'd been doing lately—my pleasure all the greater in light of that bleakness (meaning not only the argument over where we were going for vacation but also "the interval")—this kind of incandescent joy running through me. I remember saying it over and over again, "I'm having such a good time."

I think that I must have known what was coming.

The same way I knew that something was wrong, right before I found that first body in the alley outside the Metro.

A kind of prickling fear, maybe, and the lingering notion that something was amiss, sensations negligible enough to be ignored aside from a small hesitancy, as easy as falling asleep.

 _Sleep_ —the Gnostic metaphor for ignorance and the Coptic word for "death."

The day before we left for the island it all became clear. I realized just what I was to them: A puppet that the two of them exchanged back and forth, the spoils of war.

They admitted it.

They told me that "the interval" was really just an experiment to see what I would do.

 _They had stopped speaking to each other for a fucking month, just to see what I would do._

And at their admission, everything spun around for a second, my vision skewing as the world swung back and forth.

 _But the world can't spin. It's real. Fixed. Unless the Gnostics were right and it's just Maya._

My head hurt. I wished I'd never started having lunch with them in the first place, that I'd never agreed to move into V's office, that I'd never agreed to this fucking vacation.

They didn't understand why I was so upset. I wanted to say, "As lost as you feel right now, not knowing why I'm hurt, that's how I've felt for the last two months."

They said that if I had a question I should have asked.

 _Asked what?_ What sane person would think of asking her friends if they were just experimenting on her?

V said that she should turn me over her knee for becoming so distraught over something so inconsequential.

 _Turn me over her knee_.

When _I_ was the one who was supposedly so volatile.

When _she_ was the one who had lied straight to my face and _he_ was the one who twisted and pulled at my strings.

She said I had to just tolerate it because that's what she had done, just tolerated it. Tolerated me. As if that's what friendship is, something you tolerate.

And I remembered then that I _had_ asked, I had asked them what was wrong, time and time again throughout the duration of "the interval." J had always said that he didn't want to talk about it and that I should just leave V alone. He had said it was the _natural_ thing to just leave her alone. And V—

V had done just what V always did.

 _How on earth had these two people managed to obtain such a hold over me?_

I would never speak to either of them ever again, I decided. It didn't matter that we were leaving for the island the very next day. I had lived with my parents for years—surely I could share a hotel room with V and J for two days without speaking to them.

I shouldn't have gone, of course, I should have just stayed home. But I'd paid my money and money was so very dear to me.

So I went.

But I didn't speak to them. Not even to tell them that I was done with them. That I would never speak to them again.

I just strolled away from them in the airport—because of course that bitch V had insisted on us riding there together—ignoring their plaintive wails as I made my own way to the gate.

They probably think that I nearly missed that connecting plane on purpose. But that isn't true. V made them hold the plane for me, and I suppose I should have been grateful to her for that, but I'm not. I refuse to be grateful to her for anything.

When we finally got to the island, I got my own taxi, the two of them wailing at me again like fucking idiots.

There were, unfortunately, some things that I didn't realize at the time. I didn't realize, for instance, that there was only one hotel key and that I was the one who had it. What the fuck kind of hotel only has one key for each room? I had the key and I was sitting on the beach and the two of them couldn't get into the room. But I didn't do it on purpose.

I don't remember what happened that night. It's been dwarfed by what happened the next morning. By the way V held me down on that bed and told J to just go, that she had to stay back in the hotel room to "discipline the child." And the way J didn't do anything, just said "Oh my God" like he couldn't believe what he was seeing.

( _Is that really true? Did he really just watch? Did he tell her to let me up? I don't remember. I_ know _he didn't step in, though, I know that he didn't_ make _her let me go._ )

I don't know what made V let me up in the end. I just know that V and J left together—left me alone in the room—because I grabbed all of my things and got another room.

In the same hotel. Because I'm that stupid.

I remember the look on the faces of the staff at the front desk. They knew. They must have heard us screaming.

I spent the rest of the day hiding. Afraid to stay in my room—afraid to hear V or J's knock—afraid to go to the beach, which was nowhere near as crowded as I'd expected, not nearly crowded enough.

The next day, V found me on the beach and gave me back my toothpaste. Per V's instructions only one tube of toothpaste was to be brought, and it was for me to bring it. She'd made lists for each of us, divvying up what we could and couldn't bring. I'd left the toothpaste in their room on purpose, so that they wouldn't have to go without.

She gave it back and said that she was sorry that she had held me down on that bed.

I might not have been Natalee Holloway but I was alone on an island in another country surrounded by glass shard sand and stabbing sun and grave blue waves. I decided that I would go along with whatever V and J wanted. At least until we got home.

I said it was fine.

The next day, we went snorkeling. I remember how wary I felt, sitting next to them on that boat, not trusting them, not wanting to turn my back on them, all of the insurance forms we'd signed being for naught, because it wasn't sharks or tsunamis that would do me in, it was my own friends.

Yet I remember, too, almost feeling the same old joy that day on the boat with them. The delirious pleasure.

I could see the joy out there in the distance.

But no, I would only pretend.

V stayed on the boat, refusing to get in the water. If our positions had been reversed, if I'd refused to come out, she would have heckled me and heckled me and heckled me until I gave in. _Are you sure you don't want to come out_? I asked her _once_. Just once. I was nothing like her.

J and I swam a few feet away from the boat, and gazed down at the reef below. I was terrified. I _am_ terrified of the ocean. But I was terrified too of being there then, with him.

He tried to dive down to the ocean floor but couldn't make it.

Then we were back on the boat, returning to the hotel.

I imagined that there was a sudden storm and we were suddenly cast up on a desert island. Only us three. I decided that I would rather drown.

And on the plane ride home, I was so very very very grateful to the airline for seating me between those two men, those two great hulking creatures, the sight of which should have thrown me into a panic, but was instead a comfort, because there was no way that V and J would try anything with these two men flanking me.

Then, even though V and J were supposed to ride home with me—because V had said so, insisting that we carpool—I was so grateful when J said that they'd arranged alternate transportation. I said "Are you sure?" just because I had to. But I was happy—relieved, reassured, pleased—when he said that they had another way home.

I left a note for them on their chairs at work the following Monday. V had given instructions about which souvenirs we were supposed to bring back. I was in charge of the rum for J. So I left the bottle with his note.

Otherwise, the notes were identical. They weren't long. I tallied up how much they still owed me for my part of their hotel room—I left out the fact that I'd only spent one night in the room—and said it was equivalent to what they'd paid me on the snorkeling trip (even though the snorkeling was their idea and I didn't even want to go). I didn't say that I was angry. I didn't say that I was hurt. I didn't tell them how they'd betrayed me or broken my heart or that I hated them. But unless it was for work and I didn't have a choice, I was never going to speak to them again.

And I didn't.

Not that it was easy.

They had each other and I had no one. I'd walk past J's door at work, so that he could see how well I was doing. I would become absolutely incensed with rage whenever V would dare to walk past me in the hallway with her head averted, like I wasn't even worth looking at (as if we didn't still share an office).

I'd have to walk out of the office, near tears, whenever she'd laugh with him on the phone. And I don't cry.

She would turn the heat up all of the way, and I would turn it all of the way down, only to regret my impulsiveness—my selfishness—and put it in the middle. The _middle_. Because I was better than her. I was fair.

What a spectacle we must have put on for our co-workers. My journals remind me how I burned over every petty slight, every vulgar snub.

Making it so obvious when they left me out of lunch invitations.

I wonder what I did to S to make him hate me so—to make him _enjoy_ the way they turned on me.

V's glee seeping out of every pore. V rubbing it in all of the time.

My horoscope that first month: _Your outlook is particularly harmonious._

I should have been happy, I suppose, that I was breaking the chains of fate. I was flouting the evil archons—rulers of the stars responsible for dictating our future. But it just grated.

And every time one of our coworkers got me alone, they'd ask me what had happened on that island.

I thought about telling them.

But I didn't.

I thought it would be dishonorable. Vicious. Pathetic.

Shameful.

By then I'd moved out—moved into the apartment that V had talked me into getting before the island (it was a compromise: what she really wanted was for the three of us to live together). And whenever I went to see my parents, there was always some fresh new drama.

It wasn't always because of my parents. Once, it was a new neighbor who was arguing with her boyfriend. She was outside screaming in the street when I drove up, and when she saw me she told that she didn't want to be there anymore. She asked me to take her somewhere, to a bar, so I did. And within the space of five minutes of me walking through the door of that bar, it went around that I was "smart" and "a good girl." I looked the bartender hard in the eye and wondered how it was possible that this was true. The neighbor said it was the hair. "Let down your hair," she told me. She explained to anyone who wanted to hear that I had two sides, one sweet and one not. And I held my tongue, because what could I say?

On the way home, there was a streak of lightening. Yellow-white and threadbare against the blue-purple sky. It flashed just as the neighbor was climbing out of the car and I wanted to ask her if she'd seen it—it was so pretty—as if she'd give a damn about a thing like that at a time like that. _Hard-bitten blonde_.

I stayed up to midnight after that watching a Joan Crawford film. It was one of her earlier works. She was so pretty and young. And everyone got drunk and danced and laughed. Crawford was in love with a man who didn't think her family was good enough. He threw her over, but he came back after a spell, only to learn that she'd gone into the arms of another man.

There were days like that, when I wrote down everything I did in my journal, as if V and J were still going to want a summary, would want to know every fleeting sensation.

Then there were days that were so bad that they didn't even get written down.

And some days, all I wrote was:

 _and i haven't, i haven't_

Or:

 _but then i thought i could breathe and then it would be all right and there was something in that, which is why i can write now but i'm so broken i can never be fixed and the one thing i thought was good, is in fact, i suspect, not_

And:

 _he never comes anymore and i know it's because she's told him not to, with that tone of voice, probably said i haven't a right to have him come, as though i would want him to, and i had a dream days ago—that i didn't write down because i was banishing such thoughts—in which she reported that i wasn't working, when really she's the one guilty of this, doing her statistics homework at her desk. And who is she to laugh on the phone and make plans and who is he to judge me or anyone? Her pants rustle when she walks and when she isn't walking she's sighing and clearing her throat and tapping the floor. And my horoscope says i'd better enjoy things now because it's all going downhill after the 21_ _st_ _. Never mind that i spilled tea on myself and stood there, looking down at the stain. Ground-watcher me, but i'd trip otherwise, i walked like that into work today, eyes cast down to take in little piles of dirt scratched up by ants, which maintenance is sure to take action against. i remember J saying once that he would gather up all of the ant bodies and leave them on my desk, but i don't remember why. A bird hopped ahead of me towards the entrance. And now V's turned on the radio—rock and roll—far louder than it need be, when my own music (Classical) is so low, and I have no choice but turn it up or else drive a pencil through my ear drums._

Losing them changed me. I can tell from what I read. It made me scared and frightened and even shier than I'd been before.

 _At the meeting before lunch, a new employee sat to my right, and I ignored him, turned my back on him, refusing to acknowledge him until I was introduced. And why not?_

 _Then when I passed V in the hallway, she went right by me with her arms crossed, face down._

 _Coward._

But time passed, and I had to try, didn't I?

 _So I went out to eat with some girls from work and it was nice, but I had to stop myself from laughing too hard, from frowning too much, from crying. I was so hungry too, so voraciously hungry, I drank a liter of water just to quell my appetite. Then, on the way back, we stopped at a sidewalk sale and I purchased a pair of antique ice skates, perfect little knives on the edges (not that I need them, but I_ like _them, a hoarder, just like V said)._

 _It was a good day, a good day I say, but what does it matter?_

 _I HAVE SOMETHING TO DO THIS WEEKEND I want to scream, but why, why should I have to? Am I so broken that something this trivial really matters?_

 _And despite it all, I still can't help thinking, on an endless loop, how I want never to see V and J again, how I wish that I didn't have to share an office with V, how I wish that I never had to walk past J's door again._

 _And the next time someone asks me what happened on that island with them, I'll say I WAS SICK OF THEM AND I WAS SICK OF ME AND I WAS SICK._

I shouldn't compare what happened with V and J to what's happened with Edward. I was having sex with him, not them.

But I wonder.

It wasn't until V and J took me snorkeling that I found out about the pink fluffy handcuffs. J said that he'd put them in his luggage. _Just a joke_ , he said.

Just a joke.

But he had also said that he wanted to corrupt me.

The two of them thought that they knew me so well. V always going on and on about how she thought that I was in love with J, constantly trying to push me towards him, making plans with the two of us and then cancelling at the last minute so that it would be just J and me.

What she didn't understand, was that I didn't love _him_ , I loved _both_ of them. Loving them was like slipping on ice, so dizzy and fast, so fun, that gliding giddiness made all the more delightful for the surging black water coursing below, just waiting to drown me when the ice broke.

But even though I loved them, I wasn't _in_ love with them. And the thought of acting on V's suggestions left me cold.

 _I loved them_. And they just fucked me.

And here I am, still letting them control me. Letting what they did to me dictate the way I'm treating Edward.

They're still using me.

As if I really am an empty bowl, existing only for others. Never just myself.

 **AN: Sorry for the delay in responses to reviews. I will reply ASAP.**


	15. Chapter 15

**Sorry for the delay.**

 **Chapter 15: Wherein you discover that the main character is a bleeding heart liberal, in case you didn't already know that.**

 **Disclaimer: Characters, some of the plot, and "that girl" reference belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

It's no good trying to daydream anymore. It's like I'm just clutching at tatters.

 _The drought ended the night that Bella Swan fell from the station platform. The rain washed her blood from the rails._

 _I can see her waiting on the station platform for the train to pull in, the feather in her tall hat bobbing in the breeze as she pulls out—_

I try again.

 _Everyone says you go to Hell-wood shiny and new but come away dirty and broken._

 _They say Robert Johnson sold his soul to the devil at a crossroads to learn how to play the blues. Bella must have found her way to a crossroads, too, in a dream maybe, agreeing to the deal only because she thought it was just a dream, didn't know it was for keeps._

 _Because she isn't supposed to be here._

And I try once more.

 _A dwindling survival instinct is all that Bella still has going for her. She knows better than to admit her growing doubts about herself_. You pretend to be sane until they can prove otherwise. _Because the price of admitting even the slightest misgiving is just too high—her_ sanity.

 _It isn't until Cullen sees the water seeping under the door that he knows she's in trouble. By the time he gets to her, she's already half-dead, both wrists slit and the water in the bathtub a weak, pinkish wash._

I imagine the two of them in a gallery, looking at a painting by some Pre-Raphaelite of a virgin in her tower.

" _What's wrong with it?" Bella asks._

 _Edward has got his head cocked to the side. "She's—unmade."_

" _Unmade?"_

" _Uncorrupted." Edward chances a glance at Bella. "I would—" he breaks off and starts again. "I would like to see her corrupted."_

 _Bella knows what he's trying to say. "That's how you see me? Unmade?"_

 _Edward shrugs._

 _"And how would you have me be finished?"_

 _Edward hesitates. Can he say it out loud? "I would—I would have you_ corrupted _._ "

I try to get a hold of a daydream, but I've barely got my fingers wrapped around it before it's gone.

I know what's happened. It's Edward. Well, Edward and my dissertation and my brother. I've been so busy that I haven't had time to daydream.

And now, everything's changed. My Tulpa's wrapped all of my daydreams up in a bundle and taken them away with him.

A month has passed since Edward and I had our fight. I wake up every morning and start working on my dissertation right away. I work on it every night until I fall asleep. Reading and taking notes and trying to fill in the outline I've started.

I make time for my brother, of course, but he's angry at me almost every day now. It doesn't help that the school system's gotten wise to the fact that his place of residence has changed. They made him switch schools, and my brother's holding this against me, too, because why did I have to move so far away from mom and dad in the first place? If I would've stuck closer to home, he'd still be in the same school. He also says it's my fault for the whole thing with Edward. My brother says that I should just let the two of them talk. He says he'll fix it. But there was more to my fight with Edward than the fact that my brother was caught drinking a beer. Of course that just fuels my brother's conviction that it's really my fault. _Why'd you make him leave?_ my brother wants to know.

Never mind how _I_ feel about it.

It's worse right now because I don't have school. It's winter break and my brother's spending the night at a friend's. And if I have to spend another hour in my apartment alone I might just peel off my skin.

I walk to the subway, taking the long way around, because I'm still avoiding that alley where I found a dead body, and as far as I know they still haven't caught the murderer. I could call the police station to find out the status of the case, but I'm afraid that they'll connect me to Edward, and I can't talk to him.

I take the train downtown, and I have to study the map when I get off to figure out which way to go. Three women about my age are laughing as they go past me as I stand there staring at the map. I catch up with them a minute later, rushing by, only for me to have to turn around and sprint back to the station, past the women, to check the time for the last train. When I get back out on the street again, I go in the wrong direction for a block. Turning around, I follow a gaggle of hipsters, hoping that they're going my way, but in the end, I have to turn around three times, retracing my steps, pulling out my phone and rechecking the directions, and then I'm standing in line behind those three women, the same three women from the station.

The man at the door doesn't want to see my license. I make him look at it anyway, petty in my annoyance over the fact that I apparently look my age.

I buy a strong drink—the kind of drink that J would get—and then lean up against the back wall, trying to look inviting. If someone wants to talk to me, I promise myself that I won't stop them. I'll be warm and friendly. I'll be funny and interesting and I won't say a single thing about whether or not the world really exists.

When the band comes out, the lead singer laughs and says, "Well, there're no tall blondes out here tonight," and I know that I really am a ghost. Absolutely invisible.

It isn't until the set's over that I realized that he was joking. The audience was wall-to-wall tall blondes, after all; I was just one of many. He saw them, if not me, so maybe I _was_ invisible in a way, disappearing into the crowd.

I walk back to the train station alone. There're people from the club trudging towards the station right alongside me, but I'm alone and my shoes sound so loud on the sidewalk. I pass a cat sitting on a subway grate and I'm still alone, my shoes now slapping against the tiles of the train station. My ears are still ringing from the club and I'm alone. I stare out the windows of the train as it streaks through the tunnels and I'm alone.

It surprises me how much I miss the detective, _my_ Edward. I wasn't expecting that. Because even though it was so hard to get over V and J, I had been telling myself all along that whatever was going on between me and the detective wasn't going to last. I'd warned myself not to become invested.

Consider the obstacles between us: The detective thinks that the world exists. He is a legalist, even though everyone knows that laws are just arbitrary cultural constructions, and that enforcing them is just an exercise in tyranny.

Except that I can't help but remember my Sartre. Moral absolutes might not exist, but you can't just do whatever you want. You have to be held accountable. You need laws.

At least the detective's made his choice.

Even if he is an instrument of oppression, he's trying to do good. He actually thinks that he's doing good.

If the world doesn't exist, then doing good still creates karma, still chains a person to the world.

But if the world _does_ exist, then doing good is right.  
And maybe it's worth taking a chance. Maybe it's worth endangering your own salvation to create a little good karma. Because if you don't, and you're wrong—

So I've begun to wonder if I maybe had the detective miscast all along. He isn't just another cop in just another noir. Perhaps he's the one good cop in the story.

Does this mean that I'm in love?

I think of Plato's _Symposium._ Real love, Plato said, should make you want to raise your standards. And you should hunger for it, too. Be famished for it, so that you're constantly seeking love out, and raising the bar as you go along, finding love in increasingly ideal forms, until it's not even about sex any more, this love you feel, it's about the _idea_ of love, the perfection of love. Like Dante looking for Beatrice and finding God.

If all that's true, then being with Edward should make me want to upgrade. I should be out there right now trying to find a better model of him, all in some quest for an ultimate love that isn't even a person, just a concept. Just an imaginary deity.

But if I'm honest, truly honest with myself, I really just want Edward back.

I want to languish in him. The Samsara and Maya of him, if that's what it takes.

I miss the pleasures of his bed.

That's not all I miss, though. If it was, I'd just find some other guy to fuck.

It doesn't make any sense. So I try to pin it down, the qualities of Edward that I miss, and end up just making excuses, because he and I don't work out paper.

Maybe he's a cop, but so what?

Maybe he doesn't like noir, but I don't like cops, so we're even.

And is it really a crime to believe that the world exists, the way he does, without testing it? A test means getting involved, doesn't it? Grade school lessons say that scientists are objective, that they don't interfere with their experiments, but that's bullshit. The world doesn't exist without us in it to verify it. Lock a cat in a box with poison, and the cat's neither dead nor alive until someone looks at it to see. Because it's the _looking_ that makes the wave functions collapse into a single state (reference Schrödinger's Cat).

Sartre said there's no such thing as neutrality, so how can objectivity really exist? You can't conduct a test without getting your hands dirty, without creating karmic chains, without influencing the results. Ascetic or hedonist, it makes no difference. Once you start down the path, you've already gone too far. You're already drinking the Cool-Aid.

So who cares why I miss Edward?

It's enough that I miss him.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The next day, my brother calls me from his friend's, asking if he can spend another night, and I say ok. I don't blame him for wanting to stay away. I don't want to be around me either.

I take the train downtown again. I pick an art museum, the Corcoran, because I've never been there. On the second floor, I find a photography exhibit, with pictures of lightening striking the top of the Washington Monument; a protest staged in a crowded street, with a gentleman crumpled at the base of a traffic light, an ambulance parked to the left and Kay's Grocery in the back; Marlene Deitrich at the French embassy; a hefty young chap grimacing around his boxing gloves (the champ of St. John's parish); and a contest for a mystery magazine, the murder victim face-down in a field, with a line of men jockeying for position at a fence in the foreground. I feel certain the heavyset fellow—a gangster?—is the guilty party.

Everything else on that floor is too modern to be interesting, except for a very modern triptych, a title burned into the wood at the top, with mirrors for the side panels, and, affixed to the main piece, a black and white image of an insect.

The next floor has a wall of oils by Metcalf, all fifteenth-century ruins. I stand for a while examining a portrait—a girl with her cat (Cecilia Beaux's _Sita and Sarita_ )—until a stocky teenager comes to look at it too. I don't like the portraits in the adjoining gallery, a painted coterie of waxy-skinned matrons with buxom features frozen on the canvas, their features marred by over-use of that gross yellow color, like congealed egg-yolk.

As I'm leaving, I see a flyer for an exhibit on yogis at the Sackler, so I walk there, not wanting to take a taxi, despite the cold, because I would feel so wretched riding in the back, like I think I deserve to be chauffeured around. The Freer is right next to the Sackler, and I go there first, even though I've already seen the exhibit of Buddhas and Bodisatvas. I study the statues one by one, the busy, intricate carving, and I think that V wasn't right at all. There's nothing wrong about beauty, however intricate, however elaborate. I stare at the Buddhas with their sloping foreheads, like statues of Apollo, and I wonder which way the influence went with Alexander the Great and the Indian gymnosophists (wise men), from east to west or west to east or maybe in both directions at once. There's a snake carved to look like it's crawling through the orifices of a skull next to one of the Bodisatvas and there are fangs in the mouth of another Bodisatva. There's so much variation—there isn't just one path to salvation.

By now, I've made it down the long hall connecting the Freer to the Sackler. There's a painting of a yogi with blue skin. Another painting shows a yogi disappearing into a field of gold, as if he'd dissolving into the Way (which is a Taoist term, I know).

I stare at a poster for a magic act called _Koringa: The Girl who Couldn't Be Killed_ , and I can feel something stirring inside of me. An _interest_. A _fascination_. And I can't help the accompanying surge of guilt, because I can see myself buying tickets to _Koringa: The Girl who Couldn't Be Killed_ and being entertained—who wouldn't be entertained by a girl who can't be killed?—but I'd also be taking delight in the exoticism of it. The _difference_. In the _Other_. Surely that's not wrong unless you're embracing stereotypes, but was Koringa even Indian? Was her act created to feed the audience's desire for some preconceived and distorted notion of what the east should look like? It's obvious that this exhibit has been created to make museum-goers ask questions like this. But the exhibit doesn't try to give any answers, so I don't know what to think.

There's a 1938 text published by Dent & Sons, Ltd, called _The Ten Point Way of Health_ , with diagrams to instruct the reader on the use of the Sun Salutation. But yoga's part of a religion. It's not just exercise. Isn't it disrespectful to take only the parts you like and ignore the rest? (Is that what I do to Christianity, Gnosticism, Buddhism, Existentialism, Platonism, and everything else?)

There's a little tv monitor where I watch a YouTube video of Orrin Tucker's 1941 rendition of a song about a yogi who's lost his dedication to the craft thanks to his love for a girl. It's a bit on the nose, this western depiction of love and longing in the east, when really it's the west that's doing the pining, recording and selling love songs to a hungry audience, westerners all pining for an imaginary east.

Is that what I do? Pine for something I don't have, take without permission and distort what I find? I haven't gone back to the Zen Institute, after all. I haven't been practicing my meditation. I just went there on a lark, and dropped it when it wasn't interesting anymore. Was I just using it as entertainment?

 _No_. No, I meant it. I still _mean_ it. I'm just rotten at it.

I still don't know what I'm doing. I don't know what I believe or what I think.

I'm still waiting for something inside of me to say _This is it. This makes sense_.

But I don't want to just use people. I don't want to come in and create havoc, the way that I think that I did at the Zen Institute.

And I don't want to be _that_ woman, the one who changes religions and philosophies at the drop of a hat, like my mother, just cheapening everything.

I finish going through the rest of the exhibit at the Sackler, but I still don't want to go home. So I go to the Hirschorn, and it turns out to be a mistake.

Or maybe it's not a mistake. Maybe it's what I deserve.

I'm watching a video of a girl in a green dress smash things and a guy next to me mutters "Crazy bitch," referring to the girl in the green dress, and I think maybe he's right, because there's no reason for what this girl on the screen is doing, it seems, except maybe the glee of destruction.

There's a display of photos of Hiroshima after the bomb dropped. _Whatever you think about that, whether it was right or wrong, dear God—_

There's an advertisement from a newspaper announcing that some guy named John Baldessari is going to set fire to a collection of his artwork. In the corner of the ad, Baldessari has included a recipe for corpus cookies to be made from the ashes. Like it's a joke. Or maybe something worse.

I hear another guy tell his girlfriend that she's going to get on Trip Adviser as soon as they get home that night.

As in, _What the fuck kind of museum have you taken me to?_

I stop to read Metzger's Manifesto of Auto-Destructive Art. And I think that a photo of a rotting log is quite lovely until I realize that the log is in fact a mattress and then I just feel nauseous.

As if I wasn't already feeling bad enough, what with Edward and my brother and that exhibit at the Sackler, I feel sick.

I feel dirty.

I feel wrong.

I finish going through the exhibit, but that feeling stays with me. I take the train home and I try to make dinner, but I still feel sick to my stomach, thinking of rotting mattresses and corpus cookies and bomb craters.

I'm too ill to eat.

 _I feel like it's inside of me_. Things rotting and gross.

The _world_ , is inside of me. Maya.

All of it.

I try to remember the picture of the yogi disappearing into the Way. The carvings of the Bodisattvas on their thrones. Because I liked them.

But it's like something inside of me is broken.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

He's laughing again and this time I know it's at me.

I only came because I'm trying to make nice with my coworkers, trying to fit in. But why the hell do I want to fit in with dicks?

"It's just one drop," he says.

"The ocean's made of drops," I hiss, already pissed off. And his obliviousness is rankling all the more because, really, this is the fucking United States of America, if anyone should understand this, we should.

"What's the point?" he asks.

What's the point of refusing to contribute to the economic exploitation of the disenfranchised?

Because _yes_ , this argument's about Fair Trade. Something as stupid and insignificant as Fair Trade has got me up in arms. I'm positively seething.

And the whole fucking table is laughing at me now.

We work for a research group that runs studies on maternal-fetal health. You would think that if anyone would give a shit about something like this, it would be us.

(I wonder how they would feel if it was _their_ kids being forced to work in a sweatshop).

"It's my money isn't it?" I ask. "Don't I have a right to decide where it goes?"

"What you don't understand," he chuckles, "is that people like you are actually _hurting_ the people you claim to be helping."

Apparently, I'm actually _injuring_ sweatshop laborers by refusing to buy their goods.

"So what _should_ we do?" I ask, trying not to completely lose my shit.

(I fucking hate happy hours.)

"Let the market sort it out," he says (like Sherman: Let God sort 'em out), as if my choice to buy Fair Trade isn't _part_ of the market (as if inaction doesn't accrue its own karmic responsibility). "Besides," he waves a hand mysteriously, "God gave us the earth to do with as we wish."

 _God gave us the earth to do as we wish?_

 _God—GOD—gave us the earth._

 _Just gave it to us._

 _TO DO AS WE WISH?!_

 _To do whatever the fuck we wish?_

 _To fuck it up just as much as we want._

If shitting on a present that supposedly comes from God isn't evil, then I don't know what is. _Because if you really think it's from God, shouldn't you treat it with some goddamned respect?_ But I don't say that, because the whole table is waiting for me to reply, like this is fucking reality tv and I'm the woman who the producers brought on because she's so damn unstable.

" _Laissez faire_ capitalism violates Kant's Categorical Imperative," I retort.

And I stand up, because I'm not staying here another minute. I don't give a shit if they don't know who Kant was or what the Categorical Imperative was, because I'm not explaining it to them (it's a fancy way of saying _do onto others as you would have them do onto you_ ). As it is, I'm holding back. What I want to say is that at least Satanists are honest about what it is that they want to do to other people's kids.

And they're saying "Don't go," "Don't take it so seriously," but fuck them. There are kids working in sweatshops this very fucking minute, and apparently my coworkers think it's funny.

Maybe it's not the world I have to disengage from, just assholes.

I'm sure that V would say that it's my fault. That I've picked yet another fight, because I'm so volatile.

And I guess she's right, but for once that's fine with me.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

A few days later, I'm taking the bus, again, because my car is in the shop, _again_. And when I show the bus driver my transfer, I ask him if he's going all of the way to H—.

"Ain't that what it says on the front of the bus?" he sneers.

 _Ain't that what it says on the bus?_

I guess he's right. I guess the sign does say it. But bus drivers sometimes forget to switch the sign. I've seen it happen.

He's sounds so goddamned mean, like I pissed in his Cheerios.

And I'm just standing there with my mouth hanging open looking back at him looking at me.

I've had this driver before. He should recognize me. I always say _hi_ and _goodbye_ to him. I'm always tell him to have a nice day. He hasn't got any call to be so rude to me.

I go and sit in my seat and I can feel it, the tap tap tapping of everything and everyone so goddamned mean, and me looking like a mark I guess, someone they can treat like crap because who am I going to go running to?

"Why don't you smile?" the old man across the aisle leers at me.

When I get off the bus, I take a shortcut through Lot 4 to get to my class, and as I'm weaving my way through the cars, I hear a car alarm go off, which I assume is my fault for brushing up against the car. "Turn off your goddamned alarm," I say aloud, angry, because who puts on their car alarm when they're parking in the wide open at a fucking university in the middle of the day?

"Sorry."

I nearly jump out of my skin at the guy's voice. He's hanging out of the door of his car, looking contrite.

"Sorry," he says again because he set the alarm off by mistake.

And then I'm the one apologizing, saying that I didn't think anyone was there and I'm an asshole. That I can't stand alarms. That I'm sorry that I'm such an asshole.

Walking away, I decide that I shouldn't talk.

Ever.

To anyone.

But I've got class to get to, and then my brother when I get home.

My brother who's still angry at me.

The brother who I catch stealing a twenty out of my purse that night when I get up for a glass of water at one o'clock in the morning.

"Everyone steals every day," my brother says. "Rich people do it all of the time. And the government helps them do it."

But this isn't a redistribution of the profits of exploitation. I'm not some fat cat, lazing around with piles of cash.

"You tell me all of the time how you sit at work doing nothing," my brother reminds me.

And it's true. It's what they pay me for, to sit around doing nothing. "I'd rather have an employee who's nice than smart," I overheard the Director saying once. They don't want us stirring the pot. Don't want us looking too closely at the studies we're running. The words "FDA Audit" are anathema. Management likes things the way they are. I'm being paid to play dumb, and usually that's ok with me because the studies we're running are actually doing some good. No one's cooking the books or fudging the numbers so far as I can tell. So I'll take their money and sit at my desk reading fanfiction and studying, thank you very much. I've earned every fucking cent.

So who the fuck is my brother to think he can steal what I've earned? After everything I've done for him?

Except that I've shoplifted. I have. And Edward was right, if there was nothing wrong with shoplifting, why'd I stop?

I stopped shoplifting for the same reason I shoplifted in the first place. Money. I didn't have it then and I have it now, and it means something to me to spend it where I please.

I don't even like it when people try to give me burned CDs. _I want to pay_ , I remember telling J, and he just rolled his eyes at me. But if an artist is good enough to listen to than he deserves my money.

"It's not the same thing," I tell my brother.

And when he rolls _his_ eyes at me, it's like a kick in the gut.

So what if he reads Spinoza? He's still just a kid.

And it's _me_ he's hurting here. I'm not a good person, never pretended to be. Maybe I wouldn't care so much if my brother was some hacker fucking over the fuckers on Wall Street. Maybe I'd even be a little proud. But season 1 of _Mr. Robot_ is a dangerous show to watch. _Where's the money_ _that these hackers are stealing really going?_ I ask my brother when we're watching (and yes, I know he's probably too young to be watching that show, but all of his friends are watching, and at least I monitor him, at least I question him about what he's seeing). _How're people supposed to feed their kids?_ I point out that anarchy isn't functional. That it's people like me and my brother who'll get ground to a pulp when the shit hits the fan.

"Go to bed," I tell him when the neighbor starts pounding on the wall because we're making so much noise screaming at each other. "Go to bed before someone calls the cops." I _won't_ have the cops called on me. I _won't._

I go back to my room and try to figure out how much money my brother's stolen from me over the past few weeks.

I realize that he has been doing it for quite some time. I've been overlooking all of the evidence. _It's just proof the world isn't real_ , I would tell myself whenever I noticed a discrepancy. I've thrown away the _Memoir to Prove the Non-Existence of the World_ —I don't want CPS seizing it and using it against me—but I still keeping track of the evidence in my head. And I was filing the disappearing money under _Inconsistencies_.

Except that the money didn't just disappear. It really happened. Someone took it.

And I feel lost. Because if I don't know my own brother, than do I even know myself?

' _Distracted, unfocused, he's easily carried away by the noise of bees, by the cry of birds. He feels the air on his skin and thinks it foreign_.' I found that once written on a slip of paper stuck inside of a book that I was thinking of stealing.

At the time, I thought it meant that the book was _meant_ for me. That I was _meant_ to steal it, because who else but me could this slip of paper possibly be describing?

If that was fate—if me stealing that book was fate—then was it also fate that my own brother would one day be stealing from me?

 **AN:**

 **Beginning next week, I will be posting on Saturdays.**

 **The bit about being carried away by the sound of bees is actually inspired by a passage in a Carlos Castaneda** **book. It describes the victim of a curse.**


	16. Chapter 16

**Warning: This chapter contains references to suicide. If you live in the USA and need help, text "Go" to 741741 or call 1-800-273-8255. Other support services available at www dot crisistextline dot org**

 **Disclaimer: Some of the characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

I've confiscated all of my brother's video games. They're locked in my desk at work.

He says that he's going to complain to the social worker. He's going to tell the court that I don't deserve custody.

I tell him he's lucky that I haven't had him arrested for stealing from me.

And I'm sick to my stomach with terror that they'll take him away. That he'll hate me forever. That I'll never see him again.

And I'm all alone. For a short while, I had fooled myself into imagining that it was just me and my brother against the world. That we had each other's backs.

It was just a fantasy. I see that now.

I feel so raw right now. Like I'm walking around with no skin.

Everything hurts.

But what else can I do?

So I go to work every day and I sit in my cubicle and I don't talk to anyone. Which is probably what management was hoping for when they stuck me in this cubicle where they could watch me: No more drama.

I go to class and I take notes. I speak up enough for it to look like I've read the assignment, even when I've only read the Bryn Mawr review.

I wake up every morning and put in a few hours of research for my dissertation until I have to leave for work. At lunch, I do some more research. And when I come home from work, I do even more, filling up the outline for the first chapter.

After I take my brother's tv away—because he's not doing the homework that his teachers have been emailing me about—he stays out all night.

The next day, I'm sitting with him in his school counselor's office, but it's a waste of time because my brother's not hearing a word either one of us have to say.

I've been looking online for advice and reading books ever since he came to live with me, and it turns out that's all been a waste of time too.

Because there's nothing you can say to a person hell-bent on his own destruction.

I try to reason with my brother, and he throws Nietzsche in my face. _Fucking Nietzsche._ Not the Nazi-sounding superman bullshit, of course, but the masturbatory 'nothing means anything' deconstructionist post-modernist crap that's clever and cute until it's your own brother who's saying it and he's using it to defend the way he's fucking up his life.

And I can see it happening: My brother turning into one of those Gnostics who think that the answer lies in doing every wicked thing, every horrible thing.

I would do absolutely anything for him but it doesn't matter. Not one bit.

 _I'll drive to the desert. I'll work at a diner. Behind the counter. And I'll pour soda for a little boy._

But that's a lie.

If I ever go to that desert, it'll be to disappear. It'll be to _not be_. In every sense.

I can't do this anymore.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I dump his games on the couch. "Get your shit," I tell him. I'm totally calm. Like all of the life has gone out of me.

"What?" he's looking up at me from a bowl of that disgusting fake cereal shit he eats.

"Get your fucking shit. Now."

I go into the kitchen and come back with a box of garbage bags. I go to hand the box to my brother but he's not taking it so I just drop it on the couch next to him.

"What the fuck is your drama now?" he wants to know.

"Get your shit and get the fuck out of my apartment."

"Are mom and dad out?"

I roll my eyes. "No. They're still in jail."

"Then where the fuck do you think I'm going to go?"

"A foster family. A group home. I don't know. Wherever CPS puts you."

"You can't do this. It's fucking abandonment." My brother's got this tone of outrage in his voice, like he can't believe this is happening.

"You won't listen to what I say. I can't keep you safe. I'm not fit to be your guardian. It's CPS' problem now."

"So that's it?"

"What the fuck else do you think I can do?"

"You're just giving up?"

That's when I lose it, some life left in me after all I guess, some rage breaking through the wall I had built when I decided that I was going to have to turn him over to CPS. " _Giving up?! Giving up?!_ Do you know what I've done for you? What I would do for you?"

He doesn't answer. He just starts throwing his crap into the bags.

But he's taking too long. He has to leave _now_. He has to go so that I can pack up all of my stuff and take it to Goodwill before I quit my job and drop out of school and give the keys to my apartment back to my landlord so that no one's looking for me when I drive out to the desert.

I've only got so many breaths left to me in this world and this is taking too long.

So I'm gasping for air when I start helping him, grabbing his library books.

"I can't take those with me," he snaps, looking at the books in my hands. "You have to keep them for me." As if I'm going to be around to shuttle library books back and forth for him.

I scoff. "I can't take them."

"Why not?"

"I'm leaving."

"Where're you going?"

I shrug because I don't really know. Red rock desert. Drive until I can't drive no more then walk until I can't walk no more.

"When're you coming back?"

I shrug again even though I know that one. I'm not coming back.

But somewhere between his last question and this very second, my brother has started to crack.

My brother and I are nothing alike. He doesn't give a shit what people think of him. He's strong where I'm weak. And he's always been this way. He's always been stronger than me. He's like my mother. He has kami, a strength deep inside of him like a force of nature. So it's not really surprising that he won't listen to me, that he doesn't care that I'm dropping him off at CPS.

Yet his voice is breaking when he asks, "Am I going to see you again?"

I steel my jaw, because I'm already crying and I don't want to sob, and shrug again. Then I shake my head. Because do I really want the last thing I "say" to my brother to be a lie?

"What d'you mean?" he's crying now and I haven't seen my brother cry since the day my parents were arrested and that was an outlier. He doesn't cry.

"I just—" my voice catches. "I can't do this anymore," and by _this_ I mean so much more than taking care of my brother, even though I know it sounds like it's only about him. "I can't watch you do this."

"I'll try harder."

And the world spins a bit on its axis, my living room swaying from side-to-side because I've already given up. I've already decided there's no point in trying. He wasn't supposed to say that.

The whole world's spinning and I have to close my eyes.

"I'm sorry," he's crying even harder. "I'll do my homework. I won't stay out all night. I won't drink."

"What?" I'm asking, because it's like my ears have stopped working along with my eyes.

"Don't take me to CPS," he's pleading. "Please. Don't let them take me. Not like mom said they would."

And I have to grab one of the garbage bags because I'm throwing up.

Because I'm remembering now how mom would always threaten us by saying that CPS would come to take us away. How she'd tell us to hide whenever someone knocked on the door of our trailer, in case it was CPS.

And I remember too how she was always threatening to leave. How she was always telling my father he'd wake up one day and she'd be gone. How she was always telling me and my brother that she would leave us behind.

 _I'm just like my mother_.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The counselor at my brother's school has recommended some support groups for us. Like Al-Anon, which is for the relatives of alcoholics.

I think it's total bullshit, and my brother _says_ it's total bullshit, but we're going.

Unfortunately (or fortunately), the age difference means that we have to go to separate meetings. So far I haven't said much during the sessions. I just sit there and listen and sometimes cry because other people really do have it harder than me (I've never said otherwise) and because other people sometimes say exactly what I'm thinking and I don't like my own life being laid out like that, for everyone to see, even if it isn't me doing the talking.

The counselor's also pulled some strings to get my brother moved back to his old school. Apparently, my brother's "at risk" and it's in his best interests to maintain a stable environment. This counselor—who technically isn't my brother's counselor anymore now that he's changed schools—has given us her personal phone number in case we need to call her. She thinks my brother and I ought to see a shrink, and it turns out that my insurance would in fact pay for a couple of visits. She was a psych major herself—just like V and J—so I don't really trust her (all psych majors are crazy) but I don't tell her that. Nor do I tell her that I have no interest in handing my brother off to some sick fuck who gets off on messing with little kids while calling it medicine. So imagine my surprise when my brother actually says he's interested in giving it a whirl. Could be he's figured out that I'm looking at putting him into some scared straight program, but I don't call him on it. Instead, I do some research until I find a psychologist who's a Jungian, because the rest of that shit's just nonsense and worst (my brother's not a fucking dog salivating at the sound of a bell or secretly harboring an Oedipal Complex).

I meet with the so-called doctor before he starts in on my brother to give him a once over. He says that he can tell that I don't have much faith in the process. I tell him that I won't do anything to hinder my brother's progress. What I don't say, but what I like to think is clear from my attitude, is that I think everyone in this pseudo-profession belongs in either a circus tent or a jail cell, and that if this guy tries to fuck with my brother I'll fucking kill him. There will be no invitations to corruption and no fuzzy pink handcuffs. My brother is my brother and he better fucking stay that way.

Maybe the psychologist really is doing his job, because things are much better with my brother. We're spending more time together and sometimes it's even like the old us, except that now there are boundaries. I have expectations. My brother balks at them, of course, but I am getting better at standing my ground.

There's a small part of me—I admit it—that's still angry at him. That knows he's been manipulating me and that I've giving in because I want him to like me.

That same small part of me is pissed over everything he's put me through over the past few months.

The same small part—only it's not so small is it? it's fucking colossal—a huge part of me is so fucking sick of being so fucking vulnerable. So easy to walk all over. So easy for people to use. For people to ignore. People like my parents. Like V and J. My advisor. Edward.

My own brother.

I try to reason with myself. After all, I put my brother through hell, too. And I got something out of Edward. And my advisor—

Well, he's just an asshole.

As for V and J, I was just some psychology experiment to them: Take a weak-willed girl and see if we can alter her. Twist her into whatever we want.

But I _let_ them do it. And that's on me.

Which brings me to my parents. It's stupid, I know, to expect something of someone just because they happen to be responsible for your existence. Until recently, it was common practice for infant girls to be exposed on hilltops to freeze to death. At least, my parents didn't do that.

Even if I sometimes think that they should have.

Still, I can't help remembering that other people have had it worse than me, and they don't let themselves be used like this.

Not for the first time, I figure that there must be something wrong with me, something that makes me especially vulnerable. Like I really am an empty bowl just like V said.

If so, then I deserve to be treated like this, don't I?

I'm sure that V and J would say that everything that happened between us was my fault. And who's to say that they'd be wrong? There's more than one side to everything. V even thought she had proof.

I wrote it down in my journal, just like I wrote everything else about V and J down. I wrote down how V came to me on her last day at work. J had already gone off to grad school, and now V was leaving too, going to another company.

This is what happened according to my journal:

 _Then I'm going through my cache of tea and V calls me 3 times and I don't pick up the phone and for some reason she doesn't leave a message and I'm wondering about that when V appears at my door and asks CAN WE TALK so I follow her out of my office because it's clear that she doesn't want to talk to me in front of my new officemate and she leads me into the copy room and I hesitate—hating the fact that I'm still following her around, same as always, like a dog—so I say IF YOU HAVE SOMETHING WORK-RELATED TO TALK ABOUT, WE CAN TALK IN MY OFFICE, OR IN YOUR OFFICE, OTHERWISE I HAVE NOTHING TO SAY TO YOU and she looks at me like she can't comprehend what I've just said (shocked at my temerity), and that's it for me, so I say OK GOODBYE and turn my back on her and return to my office. I'm opening the box of chai tea when she comes up behind me and drops 2 sheets of folded paper onto my chair, not saying a word, and then she leaves. I glance at the papers (on the off chance that they are actually work-related) and see J's name and the word "PROOF" at the top of a typewritten note, while the other sheet of paper is my own hand-written note to V, the one I left on her chair after the island. So I tear up the papers and go to F's desk and I ask him if he's going to be here next week, using the question as a diversion as I surreptitiously drop the pieces of paper into V's mailbox, but the slips of paper have fallen down the back of the mailbox where she won't see them, so I pick up the pieces when F goes to the copy room, and then I go into V's darkened office and drop them onto her chair just like she dropped them onto mine—but then I decide that I don't want her to have anything that I wrote (a superstitious fear of witchcraft motivating me as I imagine the kind of spells that can be done if you've got a scrap of something that belonged to the victim), even if that handwritten note of mine has already been in her possession for months, so I pick up all the pieces and carry them into the lighted hallway and drop them onto the floor and go through them on my knees picking out the pieces of my handwritten note (so that I can still drop the pieces of the typewritten note onto her chair), ignoring the fact that someone's walking by and can see me on my knees acting like a crazy person, and then I realize that the typewritten message was also written by me, so I pick up everything and put all of it into the shredder._

 _And I feel as though she's wounded me all over again and once again I've retaliated not at all. Forever passive._

 _Part of me worries that if we have unresolved issues, I'll be forced to meet her again in some future life. But no conversation is possible. My words will just turn themselves backwards in her ears. And the fact that she had to come to my office like this—on her last fucking day, unable to just let it be—shows that she's possessed of a deep-seated pathology (never mind that writing this, here and now, is another kind of pathology)._

 _Except that now I'm thinking about what that typewritten note said—it was an email. And I'm remembering how we got into an argument right before the island about something I supposedly said in an email. It was something trivial—not important at all—but V and J swore that I wasn't remembering it correctly. I had disagreed with them. Because what they were saying made no sense at all, didn't fit me at all._

 _I open up the archives on my email account and try to find the message in question. It takes forever to locate it, and then I'm not sure that I've actually found the right one. It's been so long that I can only remember the fact that we disagreed, the actual details of the disagreement having become so hazy that I can't really remember what this email is supposed to have said…_

 _I open the email up, then close it immediately. Because what I see during that brief glimpse is enough to suggest that V and J were right, for once, and that I was wrong._

 _Does this mean that they were right about everything?_

 _It was such a stupid thing for us to fight over, though. Why couldn't we just agree to disagree? And I hardly think that this one mistake on my part really constitutes proof of mental instability, let alone proof of what V called my childishness and my irrationality, as if she wanted me to sign over power of attorney to her, because I wasn't competent to make any decisions for myself._

 _A vision rises unbidden: Me straightjacketed with V spooning soup into my mouth, J dangling a pair of fuzzy pink handcuffs from one finger._

 _That's what they would do to me if they had total control._

 _All over a fucking email…_

— _and the fact that V thought it was still worth it to bring this up after all of this time. What the fuck is wrong with her?_

Well, whatever _was_ wrong with V, I never would find out, would I? Because I never let her explain herself.

I was probably right to assume that she would have turned all of my words against me. But refusing to hear her out didn't do me any good, either. It's been months and I'm still not over it.

And I'm not sure that I can trust my memory.

 _Like the material fabric of the mind itself—synapses always firing and misfiring, brain cells always dying—memory is unstable._

I wonder how much of what I remember is skewed, not just because I'm mis-remembering it, but because I never saw it "correctly" in the first place.

None of that absolves V and J for what transpired on that fucking island, of course, but the fact is that V let me up from that bed in the end. Those fuzzy pink handcuffs never came out. If V and J really had the worst intentions for me, at least they never went through with them.

And yeah I thought it was fucking creepy how much time that they wanted to spend together, but I was lonely, and so instead of trusting my instincts, I kept my mouth shut. And when I _would_ say something and they'd pushed back, I was too afraid of hurting their feelings to be honest about the source of my discomfort—it would be mean to call them "pervs," after all—so instead I just went along with whatever it was that they wanted me to do. They had no right, I suppose, to treat me like I hadn't a right to make decisions for myself. But I let them walk all over me for so long that maybe they forgot that I wasn't theirs to toy with.

And I lied. I lied to them all of the time. Pretending to be more interesting, less pathetic than I actually was. Just so they would pay attention to me. After all of my deception, what reason did they have to believe me when I finally started telling the truth? Especially when what I was saying was that I wanted nothing to do with them? Who was I—pathetic as I was—to say that I didn't care for their company?

I wasn't honest with Edward either. I never hinted at the fact that I was suspicious of his intentions with me. I never once asked him what it was that he thought the two of us were doing. I never asked him if he was just using me. If he thought that sex was a fair exchange for how he was helping me with my brother.

Maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe a cop had no business getting involved with a witness, whether it was to help her with her brother or to take her out to dinner or to have sex with her.

And maybe he had no business telling me how to raise my brother.

I didn't give him a chance, though, did I?

I try to tell myself that it's irrelevant. That everyone's a user and I'm better off without him.

I tell myself that the thing inside of me that misses Edward is the same thing that made me put up with V and J, the same thing that made me fork over money whenever my mother asked, that makes me want to say "Ok" whenever my brother wants another game that maybe I can't really afford to buy for him.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

In order to get out of happy hours at work, I'm using the excuse that I've got custody of my brother and research to do for my dissertation. But I think that my coworkers have stumbled onto the fact that I just don't want to see them outside of work, and they're getting pissy.

Piss _ier._

I've got to prioritize, though, and my asshole coworkers just don't make the list.

Another thing that doesn't make the list is my Tulpa and daydreaming in general.

Fantasizing is just no good for me. It encourages the indulgence of a subconscious desire for romantic fulfillment, however tragic. And it would _have_ to be tragic, too, this romantic fulfillment of mine, because I don't believe in happiness—and maybe this addiction to tragic shit makes me settle for people who treat me like crap. Makes me _expect_ to be treated like crap.

Or so one of the self-help books I'm reading says.

Maybe that's a lot of bullshit, but for a person who's worried that the world doesn't exist, deciding to intentionally cultivate illusions is a sign of giving up.

And I ain't goin' to the desert just yet.

So I've started wearing a rubber-band around my wrist, and I snap it every time I notice that I'm falling into a daydream.

Problem is, I daydream _a lot_.

I've had to switch wrists a couple of times. And now I'm wearing long-sleeved shirts to hide the marks. But the really fucked up thing is that I'm starting to get used to the pain of a snapped rubber band.

And I'm bored out of my fucking mind. I wonder what I'm supposed to be thinking about instead of daydreaming all of the time.

Like now. I'm at work but I've finished all of the work that I have to do today and I'm just sitting here waiting for the hour to chime.

I can't daydream, so instead I stew. I stew about how the new hire, M, called me from lunch today (she was out at some restaurant) to tell me that she wasn't going to do the work that I would have done already if I could have just done it. Then she asked me (as a favor to D, who was also out at this restaurant, along with everyone else in the department, everyone except me apparently, because they just assumed that I wouldn't want to go, I suppose, but it would have been nice to have been asked), M asked me to confirm something that D had already asked me about, like I was going to be tricked into changing my story. _Bitch._

Then when everyone got back from lunch, M called out my name, trying to get my attention, so that I would turn around and be watching as D pushed M down the hallway in a rolling chair. Like I was going to think it was cute or something. _Hag._

Now G's come and he's looking at my computer.

What is he doing looking at my computer? Do I look at his computer?

No. It's fucked up to stand there looking at someone else's computer, like you expect to find porn or something—

—do they honestly think that I'm sitting here looking at porn?

(Fanfiction doesn't count.)

It's a clear violation of office etiquette for him to be standing in my cubicle like this, but because he's still standing here, I open up a file and pretend to be updating it. Of course I find something on it that really does need updating.

Then he's gone and I have nothing left to do.

I open a blank document.

 _Empty_. That's the notion I want to impart, I decide. _Empty_.

But the image this notion of emptiness summons to my mind is incongruous, won't fit on paper, not if I try to type it, not even if I take a pen and try to draw it. It's misshapen, wrong, not right for this world.

Now M is giggling, walking down the hallway. I would put on my headphones, except that would make it all the easier for them to creep up on me. So instead I hunch over my desk, pretend that I'm reading a file.

After she's gone, I try again.

I'm typing, trying to describe something that isn't there. _Just a shadow. Because no one ever saw anything. It was just a mistake of the light._

 _And it's locked away_.

That last bit surprises me. Why locked up?

 _Because that's what it feels like_.

This feeling—this sensation I'm trying to describe—if given form, would be locked up in a cell. That's what it feels like.

 _It's not enough to be locked away though. It hurts._

Since I'm trying to be honest with myself, I should think this over. _Why do I want this thing locked away in the tower to be in pain?_

I haven't got an answer.

 _It's got bruises and cuts where the manacles have cut through the skin. Bare ribs showing out under gray skin and hip joints like doorknobs._

I want her to hurt.

And with that, the _it_ in my imagination has become a _her_.

And like me, this girl in my imagination likes to daydream.

 _She goes away in her head whenever the torture device_ —they're torturing her (maybe she's a spy, or a witch)— _she goes away in her head whenever the thumbscrew is grinding its cripple song. She goes away and doesn't feel a thing._

I imagine what she does in her tower when she's all alone.

 _Sometimes she can't see out of her window to the ground. The window's too high or there's a chain around her ankle so she can just see a tip of the sky._

 _Sometimes there's no window at all. Just black void because it's night and there's no moon and no stars._

 _Sometimes she can see the ground out of her window and, though that window is too small for her to fit through the crevice, she imagines sitting on the ledge, balancing on the lip, and tipping forward ever so slightly. She imagines falling, flying, floating. She imagines hitting the ground, gouging the earth with her fall, hammering at the soil. She imagines her bones shattering into a thousand blades that slice through her skin._ I imagine her imagining this.

I don't want to write it. It _hurts_ to write it. But I've committed myself to this. To writing it all out like this, on paper.

I imagine her bat-like, her shoulder blades like wings.

Then it occurs to me that this is a ghost story. Either she's a ghost haunting them or they're ghosts haunting her.

And the idea that I have after that gives me pleasure: _She is a creature of horror maybe—the horror story they tell themselves—but they deserve it, because they_ made _her._

When I'm done writing it all out, I read it over.

I wonder how I could possibly have such daydreams. Such violent, dark fantasies.

And if _this_ is what I daydream about, what I _fantasize_ about, what the fuck does that say about me?

Buy at least this girl in her tower isn't locked inside of me anymore, inside my skin where she was feeding off of me. She's on paper now.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"Isabella?"

I'm smiling when I hear him call my name. Which is why I'm smiling when I turn around to look at him.

And maybe that's ok. Because it should hurt me to see him—and it is a shock—but I'm having a good time right now and seeing him almost seems like it fits into that happiness.

Which doesn't make any sense, because there's still a hole inside of me whenever I think about Edward. But I'm not thinking about that right now. If fact, I'm a little proud of the fact that seeing him doesn't make me fold up and crumple. I was always so weak when it came to V and J. Always so hurt. _Aren't you supposed to act as though you're not hurting? Isn't that the mature thing to do?_ That's what V would say.

But that's lying. And what's mature about that?

I'm in such a good mood, though, that it doesn't matter. I don't even miss a beat: I say hello and I ask him if he wants to join us.

He looks hesitant, his eyes running over the other faces at the table. He says that he doesn't want to intrude on our gathering, but a welcoming chorus assures him that he's not interrupting and invites him to sit down.

He sits.

I introduce him to everyone at the table and explain that they're the members of a writing group I've just joined for grad students working on their dissertation.

To their credit, they don't make fun of the fact that his name's Edward and my name's Isabella.

To Edward's credit, he doesn't give away how surprised he no doubt is to see me out socializing.

In any case, Edward's surprise at seeing me out like this is nothing to my surprise at my own actions. At my own happiness right now.

Not "happy" as in a giddy delight skating over black ice, like that last weekend before the island, in F— P— with V and J. When I could sense everything that was coming and I was just trying to lap up every last bit of joy before it ended.

But "happy" as in I _fucking earned this._

Earned it, because: "My advisor liked my chapter," I explain to Edward.

He's looking at me blankly, so I clarify. "I turned in the first chapter of my dissertation, and my advisor liked it."

Edward knows how much this means to me. He knows how fucking fucking fucking hard I've been working to try and figure out how to please my adviser.

So he's smiling now too. "Congratulations." He clinks his beer with mine. "So your first chapter? What was in it?"

Edward knows that my dissertation is on early Christianity, but I never made him listen to my spiel on the subject. I know that no one wants to listen to that. Not even the other Ancient Mediterranean students.

I look down. "It's boring. You wouldn't want to hear about it."

"I want to hear," J says. "You didn't tell us."

There's a chorus of agreement from everyone else at the table. There aren't many of us here, just the ones who've reached the writing stage, and we're a small enclave.

"Uh, it's about Hypatia," I say self-consciously, and everyone but Edward rolls their eyes and groans. It's good natured groaning though, so I'm not offended.

But Edward's eyeing my fellow grad students, looking kind of annoyed. "What's with the attitude?" he asks, like he's pissed on my behalf.

I shake my head, because they're right. Hypatia's been done and overdone and then done again. "It's just that tons of historians have tried to figure out who killed Hypatia. She's a very popular topic. And that dog is dead, so stop beating it, right? Unless, of course, you're going to nail it." I grin. Because I've nailed it.

"So who killed her?" Edward asks, as if he's genuinely interested.

But everyone else shakes their heads, and starts breaking into their own conversations, which doesn't offend me, because I'm used to it. (Though I can't help recalling all of the times I've patiently listened as they babble about their own research.)

"Are you sure you want to know?" I ask. "It's not that interesting."

"I want to hear."

So I tell Edward all about Hypatia. How she, a fifth century pagan philosopher teaching in Alexandria, was pulled from her carriage and stabbed to death, after which her body was dragged through the streets. I tell him how the Cyril, the bishop of Egypt, was blamed for Hypatia's murder, either because he ordered the "hit," like a mob boss, or because he stirred his followers up into a frenzy. But when it looked like formal charges might be brought against Cyril, the case disappeared. At the same time, the prefect of Alexandria—the head magistrate—disappeared from the historical record, which is weird because he was friends with Hypatia, and according to Socrates Scholasticus, this friendship was one of the reasons that Cyril had her killed. Cyril was telling people that the prefect was a pagan. It wasn't true—the prefect had been baptized, but the baptism was performed by one of Cyril's enemies. Some historians say that the baptism was a sham, that the prefect was preserving his paganism in secret, but even if that's true—and why take Cyril's word for it?—it's beside the point. It wasn't enough for Cyril that a person was Christian, you had to be _his_ kind of Christian. Some scholars think that the prefect tried to bring charges against Cyril for Hypatia's murder, and that the prefect was forced out of public life as part of a cover-up. A few years later, however, the emperor issued an order curtailing Cyril's use of the _parabalani_ —hospital orderlies who doubled as street thugs—and some people think it was because the _parabalani_ were responsible for leading the mob that killed Hypatia.

"But none of that matters," I tell Edward. "The real question isn't who killed Hypatia. Finding that out doesn't help us understand why the argument itself mattered. It doesn't help us understand the effect of the propaganda Socrates Scholasticus was spreading about Cyril's role in her murder. Or why, hundreds of years later, John of Niciu was still spreading the same story, but this time with a twist. Like Socrates Scholasticus, John thought that Cyril was responsible for Hypatia's murder, but John didn't think this was a black mark on Cyril's record. In fact, John thought that Cyril deserved to be bishop _because_ he was ordering assassinations—that's how much John hated Hypatia, even hundreds of years later. Finding out whether or not Cyril really killed Hypatia is only a small fraction of the story. Rumor itself and the contests for power behind it are the real story."

Edward's looking skeptical. "So it doesn't matter who really killed her?"

"It's like who killed JFK. The answer would have mattered forty years ago, maybe. Now all that matters is the way that this debate reflects a fundamental mistrust of the government and of each other. This distrust is the real story. Its ripple effects are still being felt today."

Edward nods. "I suppose, when you look at it that way."

And I nod too, because, yeah, I'm right, even if Edward doesn't seem as impressed as I think he should be.

I settle back in my chair, feeling as if it's Edward's turn to say something. To volunteer something about himself. It doesn't have to be important—it can be about some new fast food place he wants to try—it can be anything.

But he just drinks his beer.

Everyone is talking around us, a buzz of conversations, but the two of us are sitting here in silence.

And I can feel it beginning to slip away, the drunken sensation of happiness beginning to drain out of me, and I'm afraid of the empty void that it'll leave in its wake.

I don't know if I should, but I ask anyhow. "How've you been?"

He shrugs—

—which pisses me off because he's not even trying—

—and looking me up and down he says, "You look happy."

"I am." It's true, I am happy.

Or at least I was up until a minute ago.

If that's all the happiness that I get to have this month, I'll take it, but I want more.

"How's your brother?" he asks.

"He's good. We're good." I hesitate, clinging to the tatters of my joy. The pleasure I _earned_.

I want Edward to know that I'm not a complete fuck up, too. That I'm trying to do what it takes to keep custody.

I say, "My brother's seeing someone. You know, to help with everything. And we're going to a support group. Both of us."

Edward looks surprised and for a split second I think he's going to be a dick, but then he's smiling. "I'm happy for you."

It's too late though. I feel the wash of shame, because what the fuck is wrong with me that I have to go to some support group? And what the fuck am I doing talking about my brother's therapy to some random guy in a bar? In front of a bunch of people I barely know?

"Hey," Edward brushes my shoulder. "Don't do that."

"What?" I try to play it off.

"Whatever you're doing in your head right now. Who gives a shit what I think? What anyone thinks? You're celebrating tonight, right?"

And I nod because I am.

I want to tell Edward that this doesn't mean that I think that the world exists, but I keep my mouth shut. I talk too much as it is.

 **AN: Stay your vicious reviews: No, the protagonist of this story isn't perfect. But having been raised by someone who was very vocal about her suicidal thoughts, I give the protagonist of this story some credit for not mentioning her suicide plan to her brother. Nevertheless, it's obvious that a case could be made for removing her brother from her custody. Is she right for keeping him? IDK. This story isn't a defense of her actions.**

 **No, I've never had custody of my brother and to the best of my knowledge my parents have never been arrested.**

 **If you are interested: One of the reasons that scholars are so obsessed with Hypatia is of course the fact that she was a woman and smart and a pagan and torn apart in a violent bloodbath (violence against women for the win). Several hundred years ago, Edward Gibbon set the stage for modern scholarship on the subject, claiming that her murder marked the beginning of the end of the Roman Empire. Gibbon blamed "fanatical" Christians for her death, laying the groundwork for efforts to fetishize the "gloriously rational" Roman past and to demonize the "mad, mad, mad" "Dark Ages." (Note: The Romans didn't use the scientific method and the Medieval Ages weren't utterly devoid of reason. Let us not fall for Renaissance/Enlightenment hype, which was meant to bolster the reputation of men who were modelling themselves on antiquity and rejecting the more recent past. And Gibbon hated Catholics. If you would like more sources on this subject, please let me know.)**

 **If Cyril ordered Hypatia's murder, why would he do so? Some scholars think that it was connected to the fact that Cyril was engaged in a political struggle with the prefect mentioned above. It is speculated that Hypatia was either the "brains" behind this prefect's policies or that she was important in uniting the pagan contingent of Alexandria in support of the prefect. Prior to Hypatia's murder, Cyril had out-maneuvered the prefect in a dispute that led to the expulsion of Jews from Alexandria, much to Cyril's pleasure. Prior to this, one of Cyril's monks threw a rock that struck the prefect in the forehead during a public protest. According to Socrates Scholasticus, this assault was not taken well by "the Alexandrians," who rose up in defense of the prefect. Afterwards, the monk was tortured to death for his crime. Perhaps Hypatia's murder was payback. (Note: Socrates Scholasticus says that the leader of the assailants was a Church official in Cyril's employ but John of Niciu says that the leader was actually a magistrate in the city.)**

 **Another ancient source, Malalas lays the blame for Hypatia's death on "the Alexandrians," implying that the whole populace rose up to murder her. But why would "the Alexandrians" defend the prefect when he was attacked but turn against one of his associates (Hypatia) later? Were these pagans (assuming Cyril was right about the prefect being a secret pagan) against Christians? Was this an issue of gender?**

 **Strangely, Damascius, the major pagan biographer of Alexandria during the period in question has hardly anything at all to say about Hypatia, suggesting that she wasn't in fact a mainstay of the pagan community. One scholar has argued that Damascius' silence on Hypatia can be put down to the fact that she was a rival of Damascius' teacher (a theurgist).**

 **As mentioned above, John of Niciu also gives Cyril credit for the murder, but says that Cyril was justified, because Hypatia was an idolater. But scholars aren't sure that John can be trusted on this point, because no one can agree on what kind of a philosopher she really was and elite pagan philosophers were moving away from idolatry during this period.**

 **Hypatia was certainly a popular teacher. At the time, Alexandria was the most renowned center of learning throughout the Empire, second, perhaps, only to Athens. Yet the subject of Hypatia's teaching remains a matter of debate. Was it strictly mathematics? One recent scholar has argued that she was murdered because she was asked to do the necessary calculations for determining the correct date on which to celebrate Easter, and her answer differed from the day selected by Cyril. (Because yes, celebrating Easter on the wrong day was punishable by death during this period.)**

 **John of Nikiu's nonsense about Hypatia performing witchcraft sounds like standard anti-pagan hate speech. But pagans who practiced theurgy were more likely to be accused of witchcraft. Theurgy involved the use of rituals meant to encourage communication with the divine (the use of incense, words, and meditation that would induce an altered state). If Hypatia taught theurgy, that would explain her poor reputation among Christians, since theurgy advocated the notion that communion with the gods was indeed (still) possible (Christians were trying to claim the monopoly in this market).**

 **Some people argue that she couldn't have been a theurgist because she had Christians (or at least half-hearted/soon-to-be-converted Christians) in her classroom, and no Christian would take a class on theurgy. But she might have been teaching mathematics and practicing theurgy on the side. Or she might have had separate classes on mathematics and theurgy. And there's also a strong case for the argument that some pagans and Christians weren't as close-minded about who they would associate with as some would have preferred.**

 **Other evidence suggests that Hypatia was a Cynic (she supposedly wore Cynic robes and she supposedly threw the ancient version of a sanitary napkin in a would-be suitor's face to brush off his advances, which is a typically Cynic thing to do, except that stories about people doing things this are so common that there's no telling if it's true in Hypatia's case). If Hypatia was a Cynic, this implies that she was killed over politics rather than religion, because Cynicism as a philosophy doesn't appear to have rumpled as many feathers in religious circles.**

 **Alas, people can't even agree about how old Hypatia was. A teacher and philosopher of her renown would have been in her fifties, if not older. But the notion of a young, attractive, smart woman being torn to pieces is simply too tempting for some (paging the Marquis de Sade). Thus, Hypatia has been getting younger and prettier with each imagining. Rachel Weisz was even cast to play her in a recent movie (** _ **Agora**_ **). (Unfortunately, I have never seen this movie and probably never will—I despise historical fiction about this period.)**

 **Sources on Hypatia's murder include Socrates Scholasticus'** _ **Church history**_ **7.13** __ **(available at archive dot org), John of Nikiu** **84.100-102** **, Damascius** _ **Life of Isidore**_ **3.43 E** **, Malalas** **359 14.12** **. On the selection of Easter issue:** **Ari Belenkiy, "An Astronomical Murder?"** _ **A &G**_ **51 (2010): 2.9-13.** **Scholarly sources on the debate over who killed Hypatia include Maria Dzielska** _ **Hypatia of Alexandria**_ **, Pierre Chuvin** _ **A Chronicle of the Last Pagans**_ **,** **Alan Cameron and Jaqueline Long** _ **Barbarians and Politics at the Court of Arcadius**_ **, and Michael Deakin** _ **Hypatia of Alexandria.**_ **I have yet to seen an argument that's 100% convincing.**


	17. Chapter 17

**Disclaimer: Some of the characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

My parents have had their incarceration extended again. I stopped listening when the lawyer was explaining what they did to earn the extension. I don't want to know.

I'm pretty sure that I'm the reason my parents are in the situation they're in right now. And not just because I wouldn't bail them out—no, I mean that having me is the biggest mistake that the two of them made.

My parents had shitty childhoods, but so do a lot of people. They weren't completely done in by that. They had values still. Hopes. Dreams. They filled a trailer with books. Told me that I could be whatever I wanted to be.

But then they got older and they started drinking and it all fell apart. They tried to go to college off and on throughout the years. It's hard with a kid though. And I certainly didn't make it easy for them. I remember these crying jags I'd have, where I'd moan and wail that they weren't around enough. Here were my parents, working two or three jobs at a time just to make ends meet and I'd still bitch. I was so fucking selfish. My mom's first night working this one job, I went out and broke my arm riding my bike down the hill with my feet up on the handlebars.

Without me they could have gone anywhere, done anything. I remember crying my heart out one day, for hours, sitting at home alone, and when my mother came home from work, I told her she could go if she wanted. She could leave me, even though it broke my heart, because she'd been going on and on that morning about how much she wanted to leave my father.

This was before my brother was born.

I can't help feeling guilty about the fact that I've got all of these memories of what my parents were like before they became alcoholics. My brother got stuck with just the tattered leftovers.

They had him sleeping on a filing cabinet at one point (an elaborate jerry-rigged bunkbed of sorts), because my mom's hoarding was so out of control.

My parents used to help me with my homework. They didn't give a shit if he did his. In fact, I was the one who had to argue with him about it, who had to go through his things to find the assignments, and then force him to do it, his parents not saying a fucking thing, just watching, so that it was me who he hated.

I like to think that I earned everything that I have, my education and my job, and that I did it all in spite of my parents, but the truth is that I owe an awful lot of it to them. I might have been the only kid in my class without a home computer or a working telephone, but I was probably also the only one surrounded by wall-to-wall books.

I've asked about sending books to my parents in jail. It's the only thing that they could possibly want, besides liquor, and I know that I can't send that.

But they're not allowed to receive gifts right now.

They are allowed to receive visitors, but the lawyer doesn't recommend that I go. She says it might interfere with my efforts to keep my brother.

Nevertheless, something feels off.

I've hated my parents for so long, that I'm surprised to discover part of me that's missing them. That pities them.

I didn't know that I was still capable of that.

Part of me is angry that I'd betray myself by missing someone who hurts me.

Another part of me wants to hold onto what little affection I have for my parents. Wants to be able to remember something good.

Which is another reason not to go see them. Because I know what I'll see. I know what they'll say. And every last scrap of affection that I still have for them will shrivel up and die.

The lawyer has also informed me that they're pulling down my parents' trailer park in order to build condos. Turns out that this was what actually pushed my parents over the edge. They own the trailer but not the land. Back before my dad started drinking, he completely renovated the trailer. He replaced all of the cheap crap that they had up on the walls and ceiling with drywall and insulation. He replaced the floor too, with plywood and linoleum. Over the years, the floor wore through, so that you could see the crawlspace under the trailer in places, the holes covered with duct tape. But for a while, the place had been "real fine." Real fine. Almost like a real home.

When they found out that the trailer park had been sold, my parents called around to see if they could find someone to move the trailer. But everyone said the trailer was too heavy now, with all of that drywall and plywood. No one would move it now that it was real fine.

And that's what set them off. They started drinking and fighting and drinking some more.

A few hours later, a neighbor called the police and my brother called me.

I know it isn't logical, I know it isn't fair, but I can't help blaming all of this on that motherfucker who used to own the trailer park, the asshole who sold it off to the developers. He _did_ this to my family.

Another trailer park a mile away has also been sold to developers, but the residents have filed a class action lawsuit. It's the last trailer park left in the county, and the residents are screaming discrimination.

I hope they win, but I don't have much hope. When does the poor guy ever win a fight in this country?

Not that I have much love for the trailer park where I grew up, but it was home. And it's kind of famous. Two whole scenes from _The Blair Witch Project_ were filmed there: One long shot of the street next to some trailers, and one of an interview with a "witness" who lived next to the woods behind the park.

By "woods" I mean a few trees and a dumping ground for old washing machines and mattresses. It's true that when I was a kid—well before _The Blair Witch Project_ came out—we'd pretend that there was a witch living there, and try to scare each other as we picked our way through the litter (kids have good imaginations—the gas tank in front of the laundry mat in the center of the park was a horse). But it certainly wasn't a "Blair" witch. And there were no little twig men dangling in the trees.

Part of me is still angry about that movie. Like these directors thought to themselves "Here's a trailer park. Let's go find us some dumb hicks." The so-called "witness" they found looked a little like a witch herself, wizened the way only a hard life can make you, and I'm not sure she realized that she was being taken for a ride, because she sure looks convincing on that film. I totally believe that she thinks that she saw a witch.

Actually, she and my family were on close terms, thanks to some orphaned possums that she ran across in the "woods" one day. This woman took it upon herself to bring the babies home, and when my mother heard about it, she volunteered to take some of them.

Now maybe there was a reason that the mother had died. Like maybe she had a disease or something, which means that we probably should have just left those babies in the woods, but one of them survived.

My mother named him Bian Farra. She said that the name came to her in a dream.

Bian Farra ate herring and blueberries, gripping the fish between his two front paws and sitting up to eat.

He didn't know that it wasn't nice to bite, but I like to think that biting was just his way of saying "hi," because he'd let go as soon as you yelled and started squirming.

Having raised him from a baby, it was easy for me to overlook his narrow, rat-like mouth, and his long, raspy tail. Really, he was the prettiest thing, with his shiny white coat, the tip of each hair glistening silver.

He disappeared one day. I suppose he just crawled through one of those holes in the floor and went to live in the "woods."

Those fucking developers are taking his home too.

I take consolation in the fact that the motherfucker who sold the trailer park to the developers probably never saw a penny from those jerks who made _The Blair Witch Project_.

"We won't drive past the condo," I tell my brother. We'll never drive down that street again, even though it's the main thoroughfare through the town where we grew up. I won't look at that condo they build on top of my home. Not ever.

They can't make me.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I'm starting to feel like I have a handle on what's going on with my brother. We're getting along. He's doing his homework.

I'm slaving away on my dissertation morning and night, but I'm getting somewhere, slowly but surely.

I'm still going to Al-Anon. I haven't got anything to say, but I go.

I still daydream more than I probably should—walking to and from the subway, wandering the aisles at the grocery store—but I try to keep it reigned in. And I try to put it to productive use, writing the stories down—not that I'm ever going to do anything with them, but I feel better with them written down on paper, like I'm exorcising some kind of angst by getting them out of me.

So there's no reason for me to be going back to the Zen Institute like this. The sick longing that made me go in the first place is still there, maybe, but it isn't raging the way it used to be.

Nevertheless, it feels like the decent thing to do. I'm the one who found the victims who are being honored in today's service, after all. And I still have to go past that alley where the first one died every time I take the subway.

I panic again in the parking lot of the institute, afraid that people will be angry I've come. But someone sent me an invitation, so I figure that at least one person wants me here.

When I go in, I'm surprised by all of the kindly smiles. Everyone is so nice.

I keep thinking that they should be angry at me, but instead they say that they hope that I'm doing well.

Should-do says that they've missed me at the Institute and asks me if I've kept up with my meditation.

I haven't tried to meditate in months. Just the thought of it fills me with anxiety.

I lie and say that I've been slogging away.

The ceremony takes about thirty minutes. I don't daydream even once. And the entire time, I'm wishing that I could be like this. That I could be like them. Just grab onto the spell of quiet and peace that's filling the place like smoke from the incense.

But it's not for me.

Then it's over and I'm saying goodbye to everyone, even the Zen master, who nods sweetly, despite the fact that he's probably realized that I'll never come back. I feel like telling him that I liked listening to him even though I hardly understood a word he said. But I'm afraid that it'll just insult him—when really it's a reflection on me, not him—so I don't say anything at all.

Just as I'm about to climb into my car, Should-do's meaty hand on my shoulder stops me. "Wait, I don't want to be alone."

He looks at me pleadingly.

I still don't like him, but the service has put me in a conciliatory mood. I want to be a force of peace. "We could sit here for a while I suppose."

My brother is at the library, working on a paper. I have to work on my dissertation, but I _always_ have to work on my dissertation. An hour or two won't kill me.

Besides, a few of the other members of the Institute have hung back, too. I can see them through the trees, milling around in the garden.

I'm going to miss how pretty it is here.

"What about brunch?" Should-do asks.

"There's a café—"

"At my place. I made Danishes this morning."

I feel a pang of misgiving, but I want to be nice. I think, _What could happen?_ "Okay."

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The ground is red. I blink at the light. It comes through the leaves in chunks and splashes, leaving great pools of shadow on the ground. I close my eyes. The air smells of musk and dirt and moss. I wonder if I'll remember this later—the smell of the moss—will I take these memories out and sift through them, put the scent of that moss alongside those brown leaves and the sunlight?

I raise my head off of the ground. _Something's hit me_ , I realize. _Hard_.

I hear a grunt and turn my head to see Should-do and the cop— _my_ cop—Edward.

Edward is shoving a handcuffed Should-do into the back of his car.

I sit up, the world spinning around me like a kaleidoscope.

It's done that before, the world spinning like that. It happened that day in the park, when I found out how V and J had been playing me.

I think that the world's spinning for an entirely different reason now.

But how am I supposed to believe in the world when it keeps doing stuff like this?

"Are you alright?" I ask Edward, because he's looking at me funny, which doesn't make any sense at all. If anyone has a right to look at anyone funny, it's me. It's my world that's spinning.

Instead of answering me, he pulls out his phone.

I look around. Just trees. We're in the middle of nowhere. I remember thinking it was strange that a sociable guy like Should-do would live in such an isolated place.

When Edward finishes his call, I look back at him to find him glaring at me.

"What?" I'm still sitting on the ground, holding my head because it hurts. I feel like I'm going to throw up.

"You idiot," Edward rebukes me, the forcefulness of his reproach weakened by the unsteady tenor of his voice.

Even in my beleaguered state, I'm offended. "I am not—"

"What the hell were you doing getting into a car with him?"

Should-do had insisted on driving. He promised to have me back at my car by three so that I could pick up my brother at the library. "I'm not good on back-country roads," I say stupidly.

"Haven't you got any instinct for self-preservation?"

No, I haven't. I let everyone walk all over me.

Yes, I think Should-do is strange and a jerk. But I think _everyone's_ strange and a jerk, so my intuition isn't proof of anything.

I can't trust myself.

And I would try to explain that to Edward, but that would just make me look even more pathetic.

Instead, I ask, "How'd you know that I was here?"

"I followed you from the Institute."

All of a sudden, Edward's squatting in front of me and running his fingers over the back of my skull. He pauses when I cringe. "How's your head?" he asks.

"It's fine." I don't mention the fact that the world's spinning. It's getting better—now it's just a slow seesaw motion.

I take a deep breath, willing everything to hold still.

I wonder for a split second if this is it, my moment on the brink, where everything's going to come apart, and then it'll be one of two options: Either transcendence or a ticket to the loony bin.

I wonder if I'll be able to tell the difference.

"Thank God you didn't bring your brother," Edward says.

 _My brother?_

Edward's still talking: "You should at least try to avoid being murdered for his sake."

I want to argue with him about what he's just said, but nothing comes out.

It's not like I did this on purpose. I wouldn't do that to my brother.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" he asks.

I swat his hand away. "You're not a paramedic."

But he doesn't move. Still squatting there, my head in his hands, he swallows. "I maybe shouldn't ask you this when you've just been hit on the head. But maybe this is exactly the right time too. D'you really think the world doesn't exist?"

A desperate scraping feeling wells up inside of me.

 _Why can't anyone understand?_

There's no point in trying to explain, but I try anyway. "I'm not an idiot. I know how it sounds. But I didn't make it up. The Gnostics didn't believe in the world. And other people said the same thing."

"The world exists because it has to," Edward says. "There's too much we'd lose if it wasn't real."

Bullshit. "I haven't got anyone."

"You've got your family."

I shrug. Yeah. Yeah I've got parents.

He grunts. "Your brother."

My eyes flash to his. I've got a brother. A brother depending on me and needing me.

If the world doesn't exist, then neither does my brother. In fact, maybe my brother's just a trick, an illusion put here by the evil archons to make me want to believe it's all real.

If that's true, then believing in my brother means believing in the world. It means giving up my salvation. My love for him is a chain and I'm in prison.

On the other hand, if the world is real, then turning my back on it means turning my back on my brother. It means actively causing hurt and pain when I could be— _should_ be—doing something to avert it.

Is the chance that I'm right about the world being fake really worth the suffering I'll cause if I'm wrong?

The wail of a siren sounds in the distance.

 **AN:**

 **As mentioned in a previous chapter, the** **archons are minor deities/angels/stars/ambiguous-hard-to-define-entities that, according to the Gnostics, went to war with the true God (and lost) and try to keep us from obtaining enlightenment.**

 **The person who Should-do is based on didn't do any of this, of course. Yes, he was a jerk, but I'm clearly projecting some of the pain associated with my mother's death onto him, and I met him at the place that the Zen Institute is based on, a place that I started visiting in an attempt to deal with her death. In no way is this meant as a commentary on Buddhism or on Buddhists. If that wasn't clear from the narrative, please let me know.**

 **Everything about the trailer park being sold, the class action lawsuit (they won) and** _ **The Blair Witch Project**_ **is true. Again though, my parents never went to jail (at least as far as I know).**


	18. Chapter 18

**Disclaimer: Some of the characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

Conclusion

In the fifth century, this fellow named Shenoute supposedly only had to look at a person to know if he was possessed by a demon. Shenoute could just sense the evil.

It reminds me of how Should-do and V and my mother would say that they knew things about me that I didn't know myself. Like how I was so volatile. As if there was this nuclear reactor inside of me just waiting to go off that only they could see.

Maybe that's why Should-do and V and my mother did what they did. They were just trying to keep me from hurting others.

And maybe it was ok that they were doing it because I was like one of Shenoute's demon-loving pagans. Shenoute said you could do whatever you wanted to a pagan—never mind all of the parts in the Bible where it says not to hurt people—because pagans weren't people.

Maybe I wasn't a person.

Shenoute was a strict disciplinarian even with his own people. The nuns under his charge would be beaten across the feet for the smallest of infractions. I can just picture Shenoute right alongside V and my mother: Shenoute beating the soles of the feet, V hacking at the traits that need curbing (like recalcitrant limbs on a bonsai tree), and my mother tying down the bits that V didn't hack off. Cruel, yeah, but maybe that's what some people need, people like me.

My brother kept asking me why Should-do did what he did.

"Does it matter?" I asked. It was if knowing Should-do's reasons would help us make sense of a world that doesn't make sense. "The man's crazy. Let's leave it at that." I didn't want to talk about it. Just like I didn't want to ever see V or J again or visit my parents in prison.

Besides, I knew well enough what people saw when they looked at me. An empty vase. Something to use. Something to corrupt.

Which doesn't make any sense at all, because if I could be corrupted, then I must have been innocent, undeserving of the treatment I was getting.

I didn't feel innocent.

Always going along with what other people wanted to do, pretending that I didn't mind, I felt resentful and mean. Wicked, knowing that inside I was seething.

So maybe _that_ 's what Should-do and V and my mother saw in me, Should-do wanting to know why I was so angry and V telling me that I was out of control and my mother saying that I wasn't any good for anyone. The rage they saw was me saying _Fuck that._

And I know that I've hurt people, intentionally or not. My brother. Edward. My parents. Even V and J.

 _You've got to stop_ , I would say to myself.

But it was fucked up how V and my mother would act like me having my own opinion was a fucking illness.

And putting up and shutting up was what got me in that car with Should-do. It was what got me on that fucking island. Ignoring my own instinct was a mistake.

Besides, my mother and V were liars. My mother always pretending that _she_ was the one who was the victim. And V always pretending to be so at peace with herself and the world, like destroying another person is just fine so long as you seem outwardly calm while you're doing it. V was always complaining that I was the one with the temper, but _she_ was the one who held me down on that bed. My mother was always reading out lists of my crimes against her, but somehow she was the one always coming out the winner.

Sometimes, I think that the people you should be able to trust the most are fucking liars. They want to use you, and anything that gets in the way of that is an affront to them. _You're angry_ , they'll say, when the truth is they want you to let down your guard so that they can walk all over you.

 _There is no crime for those who have Christ_ , Shenoute said when he was called to task for breaking into the homes of so-called pagans and stealing their property. He was a small-time gangster, claiming that it was in God's name he fought when really it was in _Shenoute's_ name.

If any supernatural entity's going around whispering in people's ears to kill each other, I figure it's Satan, not God.

And maybe I'm wrong about that. But I'd like to think that I'm brave enough to risk going to hell for saying it, because we're already living in hell if God's down with terrorism.

It's a wager though, isn't it?

Pascal said that you should believe in God because if you don't and you're wrong, then you're fucked.

Pascal was a coward.

It would be worth it, I think, to be fucked, if it meant staying true to yourself.

That is, if it's just you on the chopping block.

But when salvation means believing that the world doesn't exist, including the people you love, then you can't afford to be wrong.

Edward said the world was real because we had too much to lose if it wasn't. That sounds like Pascal's wager all over again. A coward's pipe-dream. And if it was just me, I could take the risk.

At least, I like to think that I would be brave enough to think that I could take it.

But there's my brother, too.

Maybe the world isn't real. Maybe love's a chain keeping you in prison.

My brother's worth a prison term.

I could be wrong about all of this, of course. Unfortunately, I can't figure out a way to figure out the truth without biasing the results—because participating in the experiment means I've already lost my objectivity.

Right now, though, I think J was right: Loving someone else is sacrificing yourself for them. It means taking the risk that you're wrong, and chaining yourself to a world that doesn't exist, losing salvation, for love.

By losing salvation, I don't mean that a person should do what my father did, (supposedly) leaving that seminary for my mother and then resenting his wife and kids for the rest of his life, drinking himself into an angry stupor.

No. I mean, taking a chance that the good you'll do in the world will be worth the toll it takes on you, the karma you get from any action, good or bad.

Where's the real disagreement between Existentialism and Buddhism, after all? The one's all action—if there's any good at all, it's in the things you do—whereas the other's all passivity, if there's any salvation at all, it's in _not doing_. But until the day you disappear into the Way (as the Taoist's put it), passivity's just as much an illusion as everything else. It's a choice, like Sartre said, which means it's got karma attached to it just like everything else.

Again, though, I could be wrong.

And that's as far as I've gotten in trying to figure out the answer to the question that Edward asked me the day that Should-do knocked me over the head: _D'you really think the world doesn't exist?_ I've had a whole month to think about it, and I've only made it this far, and now Edward's at my door.

We haven't seen each other once this past month, not since Should-do was arrested. Not that there was any reason for us to see each other, and doing so would have botched up the case against Should-do, or so I was told. As it was, I was going to have to testify in court, and a surly-faced prosecutor had already made it clear that I was going to have to explain a lot. Like what I was doing at the Zen Institute in the first place. And what I was doing finding the second body and having sex with the cop who was assigned to the case.

I have my answers ready, and they all make sense to me, even if I don't think the court will agree. Because I've noticed that other people get pissed when you say that you're looking for enlightenment, as if there's something wrong with you for caring about it, or—for the people who think they've already found it—as if you should be able to find it in exactly the same place they do, like it's an insult to them that you just don't see it. Either way, I expect a lot of mockery when I have to testify in court.

And I _know_ what I'm supposed to say: I'm supposed to tell them all about how I took a shortcut through an alley and I forgot my purse. That's what they want to hear.

But it's a lie, and I'm going to be under oath. The truth: The question about how I happened to get mixed up in all of this is fundamentally flawed. Take, for instance, the issue of the second body: It would be impossible to list all of the factors responsible for leading me up to the discovery. There was, of course, everything I'd done that morning, every action without which the conclusion might have been different, and everything I'd done up to that day, and everything that brought me into this world, and everything that brought my parents together, and everything that brought them into this world, and everything before that. (Assuming, that is, that the world exists.) Which is to say nothing of the victim and everything that had brought him to such an ignominious fate. And then there was the murderer. How could I possibly account for all of the variables?

And as for having sex with Edward? Well, the court's just going to have to understand what it's like to have someone you love and someone you'd do anything for. Because it was for my brother. I had sex with Edward to repay him for the favor that he did for me and my brother.

Except that that sounds wrong, doesn't it?

I don't mean that it sounds sinful—I don't give a shit about that—I mean, it doesn't sound like the truth.

I'm not worried about looking like a whore. Or of making Edward look bad.

No. It's just that I don't think—

In any case, I'm surprised, to see Edward at my door.

But I let him inside and he sits down on the couch.

"My brother's out with his friends," I say so that he knows that whatever he has to say, he can just say it. He doesn't have to censor himself for fear that my brother will overhear.

He seems reluctant though, looking around my place like he's seeing it for the first time.

"You feeling better?" he asks, glancing at me and I figure he means my head.

"I'm fine."

Then he tells me that there won't be a trial after all because Should-do's dead. He was killed in a prison fight.

"He was a monster," Edward says. "You shouldn't cry over him." Because I think I'm crying, even though that doesn't make sense. I don't give a shit about Should-do. He deserved whatever he got.

But all I can see are steel bars.

Edward's trying to reason with me. "He killed two people. He was going to kill you."

I'm thinking of my parents, the way they fought when the cops put those handcuffs on them.

"It's not like he deserved to get out," Edward continues. "This is a best case scenario, because the trial—you know, the defense would've had a field day with us."

I know he's right.

But still.

I'm imagining those bars.

Bars and bars and bars, expanding and multiplying like in some nightmare M. C. Escher sketch.

So many bars that no one would ever get out.

So many bars that you can't even _see_ an outside any more.

And then it's just like I'm behind those bars and I can't breathe.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Around about the time Shenoute was punching so-called heretics in the nose, a neighbor of his named Nonnus was writing a poem about the Greek god Dionysius. Nonnus—who was probably a Christian despite the poem—ended his epic the same way that the playwright Euripides had ended his play about the same Greek god about a thousand years earlier: The king of Greek Thebes, Pentheus, puts Dionysius in jail. Pentheus thinks that Dionysius is a dirty preacher and a con-man to boot, out to cause trouble in Thebes.

Now there're lots of spells in the Greek papyri for breaking out of prison. One of these spells was supposedly even written by Moses, who, in one version of Exodus, used magic to escape from the Pharaoh's prison. The Apostle Paul and the pagan wonderworker Apollonius of Tyana allegedly dazzled observers by escaping from their fetters. And that story from the Gospel of Thomas about the prince who suffers amnesia when he goes to Egypt itself doubles as a spell for a prison-break—the _story_ is a key.

But when Dionysius breaks out of Pentheus' jail, Pentheus says it was just a magic trick. Not proof of anything.

People thought that Jesus was a common magician, too, opening doors without keys.

Pentheus—whose name means "sleep," the Gnostic metaphor for ignorance—demands more proof of Dionysius' power. A soothsayer tries to warn Pentheus, but he won't listen.

And Pentheus gets his proof alright: Dionysius makes Pentheus' mother tear her off Pentheus' head.

Which isn't fair at all, because Pentheus just wanted evidence. Is that so bad? He just wanted to know the truth.

Everyone says it's a mystery though. That it can't be taught. You're supposed to know without knowing, like in a koan. See without seeing.

It's as if Pentheus was stuck in one of those dreams I have sometimes, when I know that I'm asleep and I can't breathe and I can't move and I feel like I'm dying and there's nothing I can do.

 _Wake up_.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Edward wants to know why I'm crying.

"I don't know."

"You don't know why you're crying?"

No.

Or yes.

What I do know is that I don't know is if the world is real. But I don't say that, because I've already decided to take the risk that at least part of it's real.

I'm wiping my face. "Thanks for coming by to tell me," I say.

He's looking at me to make sure I'm alright, so I reassure him.

"I'm ok." I even smile a little to make him feel better. Because I always feel like I have to do what other people want me to do.

But he's still looking at me.

Maybe I shouldn't have cried. It's too late for that though. So what else does he want from me?

"I'm ok now," I say again. "I'll be alright."

He doesn't move.

So I start to feel a little annoyed. Because I'm not a fucking robot. I'm myself. I don't always have to feel or think whatever other people want me to feel or think.

"I've missed you," Edward says, blowing my notions of what's going on right now out of the water.

I'm still annoyed though. It's not going to be that easy. _I_ 'm not that easy.

"Just because I'm acting like the world is real doesn't mean I'm convinced," I warn him. "But I'm not going to resent people for it." I'm not going to be like my father, the way he blamed us for the fact that he wasn't a priest. I'm not going to resent other people for the fact that I've turned my back on turning my back on the world.

Edward seems to think about it for a moment, then nods.

That's still not enough. Edward can't just come in here and expect me to take him at face-value.

So I ask him that question from _Bladerunner_ , the one that's supposed to prove whether or not a person's really a replicant.

He looks at me funny. "Isn't that from a movie?"

I shrug. "Maybe the movie's wrong about how a real person would answer."

"Well, it would catch serial killers at least."

I squint at him.

"It's one of the early indicators for a person becoming a serial killer."

And that makes total sense to me. "Damn right," I nod.

So he answers. Correctly.

And that's how Edward and I start dating again. Or dating for the first time, depending on how a person looks at it.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I still don't know why it took me eighteen minutes to get from the exit of the subway to that alley the night that I found the first body.

I think that I was must have been fantasizing. Lost in my daydreams.

I don't like the idea that I let myself be carried away like that. Something might have happened to me. Someone could have crept up on me and I wouldn't have even noticed.

I don't fantasize anymore, at least, not the way that I used to. Even if it's fantasizing like that was only a problem insofar as I was wasting my life, one second at a time, it's more time than I can afford to lose.

I've started reading self-help books specifically on the subject of saying "no." I never could say "no" to anyone. Not to V and certainly not to my mother, and I figure it's a large part of the reason that I got into that car with Should-do.

I'm making lists, too, just tiny things that I wish I could do, and some big things too. For every big item, I make a list of all of the steps that can get me there. Like defending myself in front of my committee members at school. Step one, of course, is to know my shit. Which means that I have to get better at telling my brother and Edward "no" when I need to spend time working on my dissertation even though they want to do something else. I still feel guilty for it. I still apologize. But I don't agonize as much over ways to make up for it. And with me being so busy, they're taking the opportunity to get to know each other better.

I'm not the ideal guardian for my brother, I know, but I'm trying. His therapy seems to be going well, too.

And I surprised myself the other day by actually speaking up in my Al-Anon meeting. This woman was talking about how her mother was so controlling, and this guy in the meeting cut her off, snapping that if you've never had your parents lay a hand on you, you haven't got anything to bitch about. And I couldn't help it, I broke in.

"I'd go whole days feeling like I wasn't myself," I said. "Like my mother was inside of me, looking out of my skin. I felt dirty. Not myself. Like I existed only for her." I looked at the asshole. "Yeah, our parents never laid a hand on us. So we're fucked up for letting it fuck us up I suppose. _Weaker_." I shook my head. "I don't know. I think it would be easier to hate my parents if they'd hurt me like that. I wish that it was easier to hate them."

And this guy just _lost_ it. He said that I didn't know what I was talking about, because who _wants_ to get beaten.

"You're right," I said, even though he'd misunderstood, "I don't know what I'm talking about. But I would think about killing myself sometimes. And I don't think it was just because I didn't want to be here anymore. I think it was because I wanted to make it tangible, real, the way it still fucking hurts sometimes. I wanted it to bleed."

He just stared at me for a minute. "Yeah, it's like that sometimes," he said.

I'm not stupid. I know that my childhood wasn't so bad. My parents had much worse childhoods than me—I believe that much of what they say. You ask Edward about _his_ childhood, and he'll say he grew up between a cemetery with tombstones propped up by sticks and a motel named _The Shady Lawn_ , with complimentary plastic shower curtains to wrap up your fresh kills. What he won't tell you is that he doesn't know his father's name and that his mother went through a string of boyfriends, more than a few of whom liked to take a swing at a kid and his mom when things got dull.

So I can't help but feel sometimes that I should just shut my mouth and stop complaining. Like all I do is complain, the mountain of journals in my closet evidence enough of what a loser I am, unable to get over anything.

Which is why it's so surprising that I've started keeping a journal again. I wasn't going to. I was, in fact, finally ready to throw out every journal that I'd ever written, because it was no good collecting all of these momentoes of my hurts like symptoms of disease.

I was looking for that movie poster of _Laura_ in my closet, though, not even thinking about my journals, when on an impulse I opened one of the journals that I found there.

 _It's snowing dry flakes that aren't sticking_ , I read.

 _One dashed against the tip of my nose and slid off. I saw a Christmas tree set out for the garbage, a purse next to a bottle of beer alongside the street, with a bundle of evergreen branches left on the grass, bare white pulp showing across the cuts, rose red, and the leaves of a painted holly bush beginning to shed its skin of silver lacquer._

 _Two people from work gave me Christmas gifts. But they want to take me out, inquire into my life and they aren't bored at all by any of it. We have nothing in common._

 _V and J were right, I'm probably no good to anyone, but even so, how could they say such a thing?_

 _They said that they wanted me to be free. But I think they really meant_ free for them _, not free for me._

I couldn't keep doing this, I decided, sitting on the floor of my bedroom, with this journal in my hands. I couldn't keep turning in circles like this.

A good day—a snowfall and a gift—I apparently turned it to shit because I couldn't stop V and J from intruding again.

And it wasn't as if I was saying anything new.

So I decided to destroy the journals once and for all.

I starting pulling the books out of my closet and tossing them on my bed, two or three at a time, and one of them fell on the floor. When I went to pick it up, I saw that it had opened to a passage:

 _Nor was I able to write all of this without mama's—_

'Mama'—I only used that term for my mother when I was feeling particularly low.

 _Nor was I able to write all of this without mama's many inquiries. WHAT ARE YOU WRITING? WHAT IS SHE WRITING? she asks. Paranoia. Sure symptom of insanity._

 _Because it is clearly her intention that I cannot be._

 _Because she must possess every part of me._

I'd forgotten all about that. Forgotten how angry it made my mother whenever she caught me writing something that wasn't for school. Like she was afraid that I was writing some secret exposé of all of the shit she did to us.

And that's bullshit. If I want to write a journal, whatever my reasoning, that's my own fucking right. And it doesn't matter if what I write is trite or stupid or wrong, it's mine to write.

I wonder how many other incidents like this I would've forgotten about were it not for my journals. I'm certainly mis-remembering some incidents, even with a written record.

It's occurred to me, for instance, that I've been wrong about V and J all along. I don't mean that I've mis-assigned the blame. Fuck that. I just mean that I never understood them. Like J saying he wanted to corrupt me. It's occurred to me that maybe he was just fucking lonely. He wanted someone to get high with. Someone who understood him, and he wished that I was that person. And V—she was always so fucking competitive, putting me down all of the time. One time, she even made K measure our heights because she thought she was taller than me. Who gives a shit about something like that, but she made K measure us, and after K said that I was half an inch taller, V still went around saying that she was taller, like she was fucking crazy or something. I always felt so insignificant next to her. She was older, more mature, she had even been married. Not to mention how she'd grown up in another country. She knew more about the world than me. But maybe everything that made her so impressive in my eyes actually counted against her in her own eyes. It must have been humiliating for her to find out that someone as young as me had seniority over her at the same job, even though it was only because I'd worked there longer. And I didn't have a failed marriage. And I was half an inch taller.

For all I know, I could be wrong about all of this too. And it doesn't change my mind about V or J. I never want to see either one of them again. They're just people I once knew. The end.

But if I didn't have my journals, I might have forgotten how V made K measure us and how J said he wanted to corrupt me.

I turn to a blank page in my new journal. And I write about how I was watching movies with my brother and Edward yesterday. We were watching _Godzilla_ , the Japanese original, in black and white. My brother asked "Do you remember that time we watched this with mom, and she made us chocolate chip pancakes?" It was a good memory for him I could tell. But I'd never seen _Godzilla_ before. I told him so, and he got annoyed. "Don't you remember how mom loves _Godzilla_ movies?" I didn't. But today, I do remember. I think that I must have dreamt the memory, or maybe I just needed time to recall it, or else I'm just imagining that I remember it, and I can't tell the difference between fact and fiction. Nevertheless, I remember eating my mother's chocolate chip pancakes and watching _Godzilla_ with my brother and it's a good memory.

I write all that down. The part about not knowing whether I've remembered it or dreamt it or invented it.

And maybe I'm not putting down _facts_. Maybe it's all just jumbled, one-sided and biased perceptions and Maya, but without it, what am I? Just a jumble of chemicals. No depth. Just the here and now. You can't remember that you want to try and do better if you can't remember what you think you've done.

There's a lot that I still haven't got figured out. I still haven't achieved enlightenment. I don't want to be like my mother, flitting from one thing to the next, cheapening everything. But I know that part of the reason that I've stopped looking for enlightenment is fear. I'm afraid of having more panic attacks, the way I did at the Zen Institute. But that's stupid. A lot of it was the anxiety over meeting new people. Cowardice is the fuel of stereotype and prejudice. I've never been to a Protestant church, or a synagogue, or a mosque, or a Hindu temple, or a pagan circle. And truth be told, I think that a protest religion (like Protestantism) can't be all that bad, at least they stir things up, I want to know more about the Jewish kabbalah, and the Muslim _Rubaiyat_ is one of the most beautiful things I've ever read, blue gods are badass, and who can really complain about the Neo-Pagan doctrine that says to _Do as you will so long as you harm none_? Then there's Curanderismo and whatever it is that I'm supposed to be doing with my _chi_ and Jainism and Eastern Orthodox and tantrism and…

The point is, I don't want to be complacent. Not about something that matters this much. I might not ever figure out the answers, but if I stop trying, I'll be letting the people who've tried to control me win. And that ain't right.

 **AN:** **Sorry for the delay. New job, technology failures, bratty students, last minute grading, snow storm, stranded in middle of nowhere, screaming match with psycho at weekly protest that's normally 100% peaceful. Will reply to reviews ASAP.**


	19. Chapter 19

**Disclaimer: Some of the characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

Epilogue

I remember thinking when I was a teenager that it wasn't worth it—being in love I mean—it wouldn't be worth it unless being with the person in question really mattered. Unless it brought out all of these emotions, real and honest passion, even if it meant a passion that was vicious too, just tearing away at you.

I didn't want to be like my parents, the two of them obviously just staying with each other out of co-dependency. Oh yeah, they fought, but they didn't love each other. They stayed married only for lack of anything better to do.

It was gross watching the two of them together—the way they'd cling to each other not out of passion but out of fear. Out of loneliness. No fucking way was I ever going to be like that.

Except that I did just that, didn't I? I clung so desperately to V and J because I was terrified of losing our friendship, platonic though it was. I can still remember how happy they used to make me. Having them in my life was fucking awful, but it was also fucking great.

Given the choice, though, I would still choose Edward. Being with him is easy. I don't mean that we don't fight or that he doesn't make me happy, happier than V and J used to. But it's easy.

And I'm not with him out of loneliness. I'm not with him because I think that I owe him something—not any more. I'm with him because I want to be, not because I need to be.

But I get it. Everyone mocked Bella for having so much trouble getting over Edward in _New Moon_ , but I always figured that it was just an artifact of what was in fact a supernatural romance. I figured that it had something to do with loving a vampire—part of the vampire's natural allure. It wasn't rational. It wasn't realistic. It was a fucking fantasy. But it captured a moment, didn't it? It captured that moment when you think it's never going to get better.

So yeah, the way she just took him back was bullshit, but that's why there're so many fanfictions that try to fix that. And yeah, it's a little ridiculous that there are all these AH fanfictions with Bella and Edward still carrying the scars of their tragic teenage heartache a decade or more later. But doesn't that say something? Like I'm not the only one who wants to know that even when you feel like your heart's been ripped out, you can still get better, even if it takes a really really really long fucking time.

It's taken two years for me to be able to remember V and J without feeling that old shock of hurt. Two years for me to be able to go whole months without thinking of them even once.

It probably shouldn't have taken me so long. But I don't see the point in being angry at myself for that. I'm fucked up, no argument. Nevertheless, the length of time that it's taken me to get over them is a testament to how much I cared for them—and that's fine. I loved them. I can admit that to myself without it hurting anymore.

And no—my life's not an AH. V and J aren't my Edward Anthony Masen Cullen. I don't think that there's a way that we could ever be friends again—I could never trust them—but I'm finally to a point when I don't want their apology. I don't want to scream recriminations. I don't feel a need to apologize myself. And I don't miss them.

I'm trying to be careful, though. I don't want to lose myself in someone the way that I lost myself in them. I don't want Edward to become my crutch. That wouldn't be fair to him or me, I know that.

And I'm still dealing with the same problems that made it so easy for me to become wrapped up in V and J. I know that if I had more friends that I never would have let myself become so consumed by them—but it's hard to make friends when you're so unsure all of the time.

I sometimes still think it's strange that Edward finds me interesting; the same way that I thought it was strange that V and J paid me any attention. And Edward's not perfect. He's controlling, if not in the same way as V and J, and I overreact, even when I know that he's right, sometimes doing stupid things like walking across campus in the middle of the night, just because I can't bear to go back to being told what to do. But unlike V, Edward likes my temper (though not when it makes me take stupid risks). And I can tell that, unlike V, what Edward doesn't like about me—my uncertainty about the existence of the world, for instance—he's trying to accept. Perhaps most importantly, unlike J, he doesn't seem to be playing any games.

I still read those fanfictions about the brokenhearted Bellas harboring a decade's worth of angst. For a while I stopped, afraid that it was part of the reason that I was having so much trouble getting over V and J. But now that I'm better, I think that reading one of these stories is just another kind of remembering—that's exactly it, in fact—it's like remembering something that happened to me, just with different details.

The woman who runs my Al-Anon group says that you can't bury the past. That it'll come back and haunt you if you try.

I'm not sure that I believe her—aren't memories the very things that hold you down?—but if she's right, then maybe memory itself isn't the trauma. Maybe it's the _way_ I remember that's the problem.

So reading fanfiction's just a safe way to remember the things that hurt me—to remember how I hurt, just like Bella's hurting again—but it's safer because I'm _not_ the Bella in the story.

It's still escapism, I know that. I can't stay there, inside of a fic. I'm not the Bella who gets her HEA. I have to come back to the so-called real world and live my own life.

But maybe I can get my own version of an HEA. I know there's no such thing as a straight-forward "happily ever after." And maybe this means that I have matured after all.

I certainly don't want that passion that looks like torment—so maybe I am settling in a way.

I'll settle for the happiness that I choose, as my responsibility and my right. Not something that can be handed to me by so-called friends who will exact a price, but something I take.

That's what I tell my brother. That it's a choice. Whether or not the world is real, it's still a choice you're making when you decide if you're going to be happy.

He tells me that I'm full of shit, and I get that. His life is far from great right now and I get what it's like to feel that you haven't got any control. Like nothing you do is good enough and everyone is telling you what to do, and you can't take it. I know what it's like when you're a hair's breadth from clawing off your skin because you feel like that's the only way you'll get out.

But when you're being held down and drowned, you can still decide if you're going to take it or if you're going to fight back.

Yeah, it's a shitty choice. But it's still a choice. Otherwise, the people who try to tell us what to do would be right whenever they try to say we can't handle the responsibility of making our own decisions.

Besides, it's Existentialism, NeoPlatonism and Buddhism 101: It doesn't matter whether or not the world exists—you still choose how you're going to react to it.

So I tell my brother to choose.

I'm still not very good at it myself, but I think that I'm getting better.

 **AN:**

 **Thanks for reading.**


	20. Chapter 20

**WARNING: This chapter includes suicidal ideation, racially-charged language and violent imagery, some of which is of a sexual nature.**

 **Also, if you're gonna tear me apart for this chapter, please do me the courtesy of reading it all of the way through. You can skip the italicized passages. But if you stop reading halfway through because you're pissed, you'll miss a large part of the point. The narrator actually undergoes some growth. You might not like we're she ends up, but you're not being fair if you only review half the chapter.**

 **Disclaimer: Some of the characters and some of the plot belong to Stephanie Meyers. The rest belongs to me.**

Epilogue 2

 _Edward tried to his stretch legs, only to find a duffel bag in his way. Annoyed, he kicked the bag, and was rewarded with the sound of a crack._

 _Huffing, he scanned the tiny space, and spied his co-passenger, Bella Swan, sitting in the far corner of the darkened cabin._

 _"Hey."_

 _She didn't move._

 _"Hey!" he shouted._

 _Still nothing._

 _Edward pushed himself up and staggered across the aisle, but then stopped, catching sight of the girl's headphones._

 _He yanked on one of the earpieces, startling her._

 _Edward glanced at his watch. "We should have landed an hour ago."_

 _But she just stared back at him._

Probably wouldn't care if we crashed _, he thought darkly, giving into the viciousness endemic to so many a teenager_. At least then, she'd be put her out of her misery.

 _Edward wasn't particularly fond of his classmate. But then, she didn't really like him either._

Well _, Edward thought,_ I'm not going to stand idly by while some idiot pilot flies us around in circles.

 _He reached for the ugly green curtain behind the cockpit just as the plane lurched._

 _Thrown off balance, Edward stumbled backwards, ripping the curtain as he went, the little hooks snapping one by one._

 _Trying to brace himself, he felt the plane lurch again, and this time he fell forward, right into Bella's lap._

Fan-fucking-tastic, _was his last conscious thought before the burning started._

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I've started again.

I suppose that I never really stopped. I just did it less often.

And it's not like alcohol or drug addiction. With them, you can just say, _I haven't imbibed today_ and you can be proud of yourself.

But you can't ever say _I didn't_ think _today_.

Because it's just like that: _Thinking_. It's always there. In your mind.

Aquinas was right about thought crimes.

Not about what constitutes a thought crime, but about the fact that they exist.

I don't want to write it down. I don't want it to live outside of me.

I don't even like thinking about it—at least, not abstractly. I don't like thinking about _it_ as a thing separate from myself. Or separate myself from what it is, when I'm thinking _inside_ of it. In the _midst_ of it.

 _Fantasy_.

 _Fantasizing_.

It's such a trivial word. So gross.

The word's a mockery of itself—especially when you think of the awful, monstrous things it does; the awful, monstrous things it allows; the awful, monstrous things it glorifies.

And I don't even mean the men's rights activists who chortle over _Fifty Shades of Gray_ like it's a license to rape— _oh so women fantasize about violence do they?—_ though that's bad enough, especially with everything else that's going on in this country right now.

I mean like that girl who killed someone and then said it was for the Slender Man. _The Slender Man_. Who doesn't even exist. Who's just a made up thing. It doesn't, in my opinion, even rise to the level of a genuine urban legend. No, it's a completely and utterly made up thing.

I mean like wasting all of your time on fantasies, letting them assuage you, while people—flesh and blood _people_ —are choking to death on your apathy.

It makes sense in a way that I feel a kind of kinship with that Slender Man girl.

Not that I think that she was right or even sane. No. Just that I can't help but notice that I looked like her when I was her age. And I was stupid. And angry. And selfish. And I didn't give a fuck about people.

 _And look at what I've done now._ All this blood on my hands.

I'll never wash it off.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

 _Edward woke up to mahogany. Red light and mahogany cobwebs stirring delicately with his breath._

 _Dappled sunlight created red highlights in the locks of hair hanging over Edward's eyes, the strands trembling with his exhalations._

 _He sighed, relishing the warmth. Not even the pain in his leg could ruin this._

 _He was alive and warm._

 _Ok, warm_ er _. He was still pretty fucking cold. But at least he wasn't shivering anymore._

 _Edward had to admit, when he realized that Swan intended to sleep next to him—like_ right _next to him—he had made a crude joke about not remembering to bring any condoms._

" _Do you want to freeze to death?" she had snapped, and he'd sobered up long enough to apologize._

 _Good thing too, because without her, he_ would _have frozen to death._

 _His teeth were chattering so much that, at one point, he was afraid that they were going to chip._ The airline is going to pay for my caps when we got rescued, _he had thought to himself somewhere around midnight_ _ **.**_ _And he'd pulled Swan just a little closer, not giving a fuck, because it was so cold that his leg was numb and not even the shivering seemed to be affecting it._

 _Now that it was morning and the sun was shining, Edward could afford to be glib. He felt Swan stirring and he couldn't help smiling._

 _"Was that good for you?" he quipped as she sat up. It would take more than a plane crash and a broken leg to squash the Cullen wit._

 _But Swan didn't reply._

 _She still had those damn headphones on, too, which was clearly just meant to annoy Edward, since he knew damn well that the battery on her mp3 player was dead._

 _Edward chewed on his lip, watching as Swan disappeared behind the curtain at the front of the plane. He knew where she was going—_ outside _. Through the hole in the windshield. The door of the plane wouldn't open. The only way in or out was through the hole in the windshield made by the pilot's body when they crashed._

 _Edward would've been more inclined to pity the pilot's unseemly demise if not for the empty liquor bottles that Swan found next to the pilot's seat._

 _Making use of one of the empty liquor bottles, Edward relieved himself. His movements had been restricted following the crash by what was very obviously a broken leg. He had yet to venture off of the plane and was entirely dependent upon Swan._

 _Which would've been alright were he not Swan's sworn enemy._

 _It wasn't as if he had_ set out _to offend Swan. But she was the Chief's daughter. Everyone knew that she was a narc. She was definitely the one behind Tyler getting busted for dealing drugs._

 _That was why it was so very sweet the day that cop showed up in school to arrest Swan. Edward stood in the hallway, watching the cop talk to her. He saw the way she collapsed on the floor—_

 _And he thought,_ Figures. The Chief's perfect little daughter—the narc—a cokehead _._

 _But then the cop had Swan on her feet and he was dragging her down the hallway. She started fighting him, and he just jerked her along._

 _"Have fun in lock-up," Edward sing-songed as they passed._

 _"What the hell's wrong with you?" Mrs. Cope hissed, glaring at Edward. "Her father's been killed."_

 _So yeah, Edward was a dick._

 _Because that day in the hallway was the last time he'd ever heard Swan say a word. He didn't know what she was doing on this trip._

 _It was supposed to be one of those do-gooder-vacation things. Spring break plus some charity work to add to your resume. Really, it was just a way to get away from his parents._

 _He sat in the plane, trying to readjust his leg so that it wouldn't hurt quite so much—an exercise in futility—and wondered what everyone was doing back in base camp._

 _He and Swan were supposed to be delivering supplies to some members of an indigenous tribe who lived miles away from everything else. They were_ supposed _to be back in camp by now. It was_ supposed _to be a short day trip._

 _Instead, they were stranded in the middle of a snowy no man's land, obviously having gone off of their flight plan, otherwise someone would've come by now to help them. And if there was a black box, it had apparently malfunctioned. There was no cell service and no radio. Nothing and no one._

 _At least they had the supplies that they were bringing to that tribe. They had some food at least. And some medical supplies._

 _But otherwise, they were completely and utterly fucked._

 _To be fair, Edward was the one with a broken leg. Swan was just fine. She could walk somewhere and get help maybe._

 _Was that what she was doing right now?_

 _Had she already left?_

 _Why didn't she tell him that she was going?_

 _She wouldn't just_ leave _him, would she?_

 _She was so strange. So quiet, even before her father died._

 _She clearly didn't give a fuck about anyone or anything but herself._

 _She wouldn't leave him though—she couldn't._

 _Well, maybe not intentionally, but there were polar bears, weren't there? And wolves._

 _When five hours passed and Swan still hadn't come back, Edward gave up and cried like a fucking bitch._

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

The sick thing—the really, truly sick thing—is that I'm _actively trying_ to fantasize these days.

I'm having to _force_ myself to do it.

Because I'm just so angry all of the time.

So sad.

And so fucking fucking fucking angry.

It's eating me up. I can feel it eating me up until that there's nothing left.

So I force myself to fantasize for a few minutes when I'm trying to fall asleep at night. Just to get my mind from spinning in circles about everything in the news. The tweets and the reports and _just everything._

But it's not working. Fantasizing feels wrong somehow—like I can see _through_ the pictures in my head.

I think it's because I'm so caught up in my anger and my sadness about what's going on in the real world—what's happening is too awful for me to waste time wondering if the world's _real_ anymore—I think that I'm so caught up in reality that there's nothing left over for the stories in my head. I can't _feel_ them anymore.

I used to fantasize because it was the only safe place to feel things—that's what I think anyhow. If I ever showed people how I felt in real life, they'd use it against me. My mother, V—, and everyone else. They'd use my dreams and my pain and my love against me.

But now—

Well, the truth is that I'm not allowed to let these people know what I think of them, am I?

And I _hate_ them. These students. Their parents. The other teachers. This whole fucking town.

 _I didn't think it would be like this_.

I feel it like a physical wound.

Especially after the election—which of course they're all celebrating in this town—I feel it like a physical wound.

And it _hurts_ how fucking white everyone is this town. I feel like my eyes are starving. I didn't know that was even possible. How can my _own vision_ hunger?

If that's how _I_ feel, and I'm white, I can't even imagine how non-whites feel in a situation like this.

No one here gets it. I can tell they don't get it. They think it's _normal_ for everyone to be white.

And it makes it so much worse that Edward and my brother aren't getting it either.

I only see them on weekends now. It's a four and a half hour drive from here to Edward's apartment. My brother's staying with him while I finish out the semester.

At first, I felt awful leaving them—like I was abandoning them. But they knew how important this was to me. They supported me.

And now? Now, I'm—

(I'm angry at them.)

I'm jealous that Edward and my brother are four and a half hours away.

I'm jealous that they're _there_ while I'm _here._

I hate here.

And they don't even get it.

I've tried to explain to them, but they think it's just homesickness.

It's true that I miss them. But it's more than that. It's like my eyes are on a starvation diet.

I didn't know that your _eyes_ could be sad. That they could get a kind of snow blindness—I feel like cringing away—from all of the sameness.

My first month here, I used to count all of the people of color. I'd say to myself _There's two. There's one._ _There's the first one in two weeks_.

I've never done anything like that before. Never counted people. I never _had_ to do that before.

My brother says I sound racist. But he doesn't know what it was like. He gets to see people of all different shades every day, on every street, in every building.

I don't care if I sounded racist, either. I hate it here.

Edward has pointed out that I should've realized everyone would be white when I was applying for the job. But I didn't.

And I just don't get how the people in this town can stand it. How they don't get that something's wrong here. I don't understand how they aren't trying to fix it. I don't—not when the sea of whiteness _hurts_. Like I want to fucking scream sometimes from the fucking _sameness_. The white upon white upon white.

 _Don't they know?_

The sheer beauty—I've never before viscerally longed for sights and sounds and smells and tastes, every sense just _aching_ —the _gleam_ of deep brown skin tones and the _breathtaking_ variety, from milky mocha to a soft golden glow, the _exquisite_ angles of eyes and cheeks against straight black hair, the _roundness_ of honeyed nose and eyes against black curls, the intoxicating delight of difference, the whiff of scents unimagined, cocoa and garam masala and other scents I've never learned the name of, and _sounds_ , from the jingle of different accents twisting vowels in ways that I never would've dreamt of, and dialects I never would've thought of, the _delight_ of not understanding any of the words being said—just getting to listen to the musicality of strangeness—and the _music_ , from Mongolian throat singing to Bollywood to Korean opera to African drums, and the _tastes_ , so exotic that the tongue can't even process them all, they _overwhelm_ , they _confuse_ , they _delight_ , fromlemongrass and basil to mango sticky rice and dahl and injera, some of it jarring in its strangeness (to me) yes, but then some of it oh so wonderful for being so very _Other_ , and yeah, some of it never being something I'll like, but even that's worth it, even the realization that there's something outside of me, the realization of my smallness, the humility, making me feel tiny and quiet, which is _such a revelation_ , such a _relief_ , to know that there are things I don't know, things outside of me, things I'll never know.

But everyone in this town thinks that they know everything because they _do_ know everything. Everything about their tiny little square of the earth and they have no interest—no _belief—_ in anything outside of it.

Everyone in this town talks the same way. They all have the same accent. The very same thoughts.

I stand out—even with my white skin—I don't fit in. They hear the way that I talk and just know that I'm an outsider.

I think that I give it away in other ways, too. With my five dollar coke bottle sunglasses and big black straw hat and thrift shop clothes—all of it cheap but all of it business casual because you can't just go out for milk in the streets where I used to work with torn up jeans and a crumpled, stained t-shirt.

So I look different. I speak differently. I think differently.

And people in this town see me coming from a mile away.

I _annoy_ them. I can just tell.

I hate this place.

I told Edward that I wanted to do something hard. I had a PhD—I was supposed to be looking for work at a university or a college. Edward was going to follow me.

But I wanted to "give back" first.

My brother supported me. He even said that he was proud of me, even though it meant that I had to leave him behind—and despite everything going on with our parents—he said that it was the right thing to do.

I signed up for a program teaching at a high school in one of the lowest income communities in the country. I wasn't doing it for the college debt forgiveness. I didn't have any debt. I was doing it because I believed in the program.

I expected to be put in the inner city. I'd heard horror stories about Baltimore, about metal detectors and teachers being beaten up by students. But I wanted to try.

I would've given anything to have been placed in Baltimore.

Here, I'm not worried about being beaten up. There are no metal detectors.

Instead, I'm scared of being shot. My students joke about their shooting prowess.

I _despise_ guns. I make Edward lock his gun up in the apartment. I'm absolutely certain that if there had been a gun in that trailer when I was growing up, one or more people would've died. But my students think that I'm a joke—a coward and maybe even un-American—for not owning a gun.

And, with a handful of exceptions, they're all white.

The teaching itself is hard—I'm teaching American history, which I haven't studied since high school. My degrees are in Anthropology and ancient Mediterranean history. So I'm playing catch-up trying to teach US history. I'm working ten-to-twelve hour days studying and grading and putting lessons together.

As for the classroom—

It's a fucking nightmare. They're running right over me.

I've taught at the college level before. I have experience.

But it's not even comparable.

These kids are fucking animals.

They make my brother look like a fucking saint.

And I hate them.

I shouldn't feel like this. These are _my_ people, aren't they? I grew up in the poorest neighborhood in my district.

But I was in one of the richest counties in America. I had a good high school.

The kids I'm teaching have one of the worst education systems in the country. You'd have to go to a Native American reservation to find worse.

These kids know it too. They know how the country makes fun of them.

Hicks and sister-fuckers. That's what the country says about them.

That's what _I_ say about them.

Because these _aren't_ my people. With their fucking Confederate flags. _Fucking traitors_ —that's what they are. Always so sure that the government's coming for them, claiming that _they're_ the true patriots, when all along they're claiming allegiance to a flag that belonged to goddamn traitors.

 _And I'm supposed to feel sorry for them?_

Not on your life.

They're poor—so fucking what? They're white. They have the _currency_ of whiteness. Do they not know how fucking much that's worth in this country?

It's their own fault if they're not making any progress.

I grew up in a fucking trailer and what did I do? I worked my fucking ass off. I dragged myself up by my fucking bootstraps.

They _deserve_ it. Their fucking ignorance and prejudice—they _deserve_ poverty.

When I signed up for this teaching program, I told my brother that I wanted to help the less fortunate. I was so sure that if I could just convey to these students how it was for me—how learning was like a drug, how it pulled me up out of the trailer park—that I could change their lives. I could save them.

What a fucking joke.

They hate me.

I hate them.

I hate their fucking twang. I hate their fucking food. I hate their fucking music. I hate their fucking clothes. I hate the sameness of all their faces. I hate the monotony of their fucking thoughts. I hate their _poverty_ in material possessions and speech and vision. It's all of a piece.

And I'm stuck here for another three months.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

" _What's this?" Edward asked, eying the little pill in Swan's hand._

 _There was no pill bottle in sight. Swan had slipped the pill out of her pocket. Which inspired the question: What was she doing with pills just sitting in her pocket?_

" _Percocet," she said, an annoyed tone in her voice._

 _Edward took the pill out of her hand, and studied it in the light. Not that he would know what Percocet was supposed to look like—_

 _He shook his head. "Did you have this all along?"_

" _Just take it."_

" _Why?"_

 _"Because you need it."_

 _"Are there any other pills?"_

 _"No."_

 _Edward swallowed thickly. As much as his leg hurt, he had grown almost used to the pain. "Maybe I should save it," he said._

 _"No, you need it now."_

 _"Why the fuck do I need it now?"_

 _Instead of answering him, she began dragging the blankets they'd been using to keep themselves warm towards the front of the plane._

 _"I swear to God, if you don't fucking tell me what you're doing, I'm going to—" Edward broke off. What could he really do?_

 _So he took the pill, drinking it down with the last of the water, and watched as Swan disappeared with the blankets._

 _Swan returned for another load. And another. When she came back a third time, she asked Edward if the pill had kicked in yet._

" _Why?" he asked wearily._

" _Because we're going outside."_

" _You want me to crawl through the front of the plane on a busted leg?" Just imagining the agony of trying to shift his leg—_

 _The Percocet barely knocking a dent in the pain._

 _He wanted an explanation. He was sick of Swan delivering orders and then ignoring him. "I thought you said that it was better in the plane."_

" _I've built a kind of shelter. We can have fire. It will be warmer."_

" _It'll be_ warmer _? Out_ there _?" Edward felt like he was losing his mind._

" _We can't have a fire inside of the plane," she reminded him._

" _It'll be warmer," Edward said again, trying to talk himself into it._

 _And taking a deep breath, he sat up, ready to give it a try._

 _But even that small movement sent a ripple of agony through his leg._

" _I—" he broke off, breathing hard as he forced himself not to cry out._

" _I just—" he stopped again._

 _Edward_ couldn't _do it. He_ couldn't.

" _I'll stay in here," he said at last, still breathing hard._

" _Are you—" Swan paused. "The_ fuck _you are."_

" _I'm staying here," Edward declared, trying to mask the pain in his voice with anger._

" _I'll leave you," Swan warned him. "I will leave you to freeze to death."_

 _Of course she would. He let out a short chuckle, sardonic humor laced with a touch of hysteria. "You go do what you have to."_

 _Suddenly, without warning, Swan kicked him._

 _Not hard. Just tapped his leg really. But it was enough to have Edward doubled over and gasping, with tears in his eyes._

" _Stop being a little bitch and let's go!" She tugged on his arm._

" _You fucking bitch."_

" _Let's_ go _!" She tugged again._

 _Swan wasn't strong enough to carry Edward out of that plane, but she was clearly strong enough to make his life a living hell._

" _I fucking hate you," he spat._

" _Not as much as I hate you," she replied._

 _He was going to fucking kill her. That was the only reason he was willing to heave himself up, yanking on her arms and feeling slightly vindicated when he saw her wince at his weight. He was going to get out of this fucking plane and then he was going to fucking kill her._

 _Easier said than done. By the time Edward had made it to the front of the plane and down to the ground—having to jump a couple of feet and landing in a heap in the dirty snow—he felt like he was going to pass out._

 _Or vomit._

 _Vomit and then pass out in his vomit._

 _Leaning heavily on Swan, Edward hop-staggered to the little shelter that she'd built alongside of and underneath the plane._

" _You're fucking kidding me," Edward wheezed, taking in the ramshackle structure._

 _The plane itself made-up the roof and two sides of the hovel, the other two sides being made-up of crates of supplies, scraggly tree branches, and—wait for it—_ snow _._

 _Fucking snow._

 _She had cleared the snow away from the ground inside of the shelter, and piled the cushions and blankets from the plane. Off to the side, there was a barren space with a pile of sticks and such that he figured she meant to use for a fire._

" _This isn't real," Edward said, as Swan helped him leverage him into the shelter._

 _He had to be unconscious. Or dreaming. Because there was no way that this was fucking real._

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"You're racist against Latinos," my brother says, with this accusatory tone in his voice, shaking his head at me.

And I open my mouth to argue with him— _Fuck him_ —but I close it again, because he's right.

I couldn't possibly—if asked to—say just why that's the case.

I was forced to take five years of Spanish when I wanted to take German or French. My mother said that she wouldn't have German spoken in her home and she didn't think that I could hear well enough to take French (the accent is so hard to master, she said). So she made me take Spanish.

I fucking hated it. The same goddamned vocabulary year after year. Over and over and over again. Just like they made me relearn the previous year's math for the first semester, year after year, but even worse, because it was the most elementary words. Like _Where is the bathroom_ and _Me llamo_ insert random made-up Spanish name.

I put my foot down senior year and took French instead.

Only to find out that sixth year Spanish students got to read an actual book: _Don Quixote_.

And there I was, learning basic vocabulary again.

But that isn't the reason.

I remember standing in a grocery store one day, and feeling a wave of aggravation washing over me at the spectacle of a mother speaking to her children. I couldn't understand a word she was saying—and for some reason it was annoying. Why couldn't she speak English? I was too young to appreciate and treasure the dissonance of ignorance—of not understanding what I was hearing. The lyricism of the Other.

I remember one Latino guy after another, throwing that machismo bullshit in my face.

And that motherfucker at the bank who accused me of stealing—

Maybe it was the Latino garage that ripped my mother off that one time. (She made me walk to the payphone on the corner and call the police. She told me to tell them that it was a case of "Grand theft auto." Oh, how I hated her for it. But I did it, because I was afraid that she would find out that I hadn't used the words she'd told me to employ.) It wasn't even the owner's fault. It was our neighbor's fault—our _white_ neighbor's fault. He'd taken my mother's money to do the work and then just ran off with it. The owner of the garage got dragged into the mess, but it wasn't his fault. Yeah, maybe he compounded it with some shady shit of his own, but he wasn't the source of the problem.

I could go on and on with little examples like that. Manufacture a bullshit excuse.

But there's no such thing as a rational explanation for what is a fundamentally irrational feeling: _Racism._

"You don't like Latinos," my brother reminds me.

And he's right not to let me forget. He's right to hold me accountable.

 _I deserve it._

He's a senior in high school now. He keeps wanting to go to protests. We're so close to DC, too.

But Edward's worried about violence breaking out. And Edward's in charge of my brother now, with me all of the way out here.

I sympathize with my brother—I want be there too.

He's _my brother_ though. I'm afraid that something will happen to him at one of these protests. There's so much violence.

I beg him to stay home.

"What if it was us?" he asks. "What if _we_ were the ones they were coming for?"

I know he's right. _I know he's right._

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

 _The first night in the shelter was marginally better than the previous night they'd spent in the plane. They feasted on warm soup. And the fire kept away the worst of the chill, though the smoke tended to accumulate in their shelter instead of escaping out the little hole she'd left for it._

 _There was also the wind. Swan got up several times during the night, trying to shove snow in the cracks of her "walls." But it was no good. The wind kept finding a way in._

 _The last time she went to get up, Edward stopped her. "Just leave it," he said. Because it was every time she got up, they lost what little heat they had managed to build up by huddling together. It was much better to cower under their meager blankets, hiding from the draft._

 _Then the howling started._

 _At first, Edward didn't realize just what it was that he was hearing. "The wind?" he asked._

" _Shhh—" Swan replied, both because she was straining to hear and because she was afraid of attracting any attention from whatever it was making so much racket._

 _A snarl suddenly sounding right outside their shelter confirmed the worst of their fears._

 _Edward cursed. "What are they doing?" he asked, sotte voce._

 _Not replying, Swan kept her eye on the wall of crates and snow that she'd erected for their shelter. She wasn't stupid enough to think that it would hold._

" _I thought wolves weren't supposed to be this aggressive," Edward whispered._

 _Swan felt in her pocket for the switchblade she'd found on the pilot. It was the only real weapon they had._

 _Still whispering, Edward asked, "They're probably just investigating, right? It's not like they would attack us. Maybe there's a dead animal somewhere around here."_

 _Huddled as he was with Swan, he couldn't help feeling the way she cringed at his suggestion._

"Is _a dead animal out there?" he asked._

 _She shrugged._

 _Not liking that one bit, he pressed for an answer. "Did you see one?"_

 _After a hesitation, she answered. "Maybe."_

" _Maybe? What the fuck does that mean? Either you saw a carcass or you didn't."_

" _The pilot."_

" _The pilot?!" Edward had completely forgotten about him. "Did you—Is he just laying out there in the snow?"_

" _I tried to bury him."_

" _You_ tried _?"_

" _I did the best that I could," she hissed back at him._

 _And Edward realized that it was pointless to push the argument any further._

 _But then another thought occurred to him._

" _D'you think it's_ just _wolves?" he asked._

 _He recalled all of the warnings that Mr. Banner had given them. Polar bears were known to frequent the area._

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

Masilowski was a racist.

It came as such a shock when his diaries were published and we could all read his horrible, secret thoughts about the Trobriand Islanders that he was studying.

Masilowski's anthropological work with the Trobriand Islanders is pivotal to the recognition of the incipient racism running through Western academia. Not because we saw how racist _he_ was—we didn't know about that until we saw his diaries—but because his research made us see just how fucking relative our Western views actually are. Made us see that we aren't as scientific or as objective as we think—or rather, that there is a separation between truly objective, scientific, peer reviewed research and the cultural work that we've been treating as if it was science.

(Thanks to Masilowski's work, we realized, for instance, that time isn't necessarily linear. Time just might be cyclical. The fact that we think that time is linear is because we've been taught to think of it as such. I don't mean _time_ like in a laboratory. I mean _time_ like in the stories we tell each other. An example: Until now, I've always assumed that Marx's _18_ _th_ _Brumaire_ was absolute bullshit. But history's repeating every day—only it's a fucking farce this time around. And I'm teaching Nixon's impeachment in class, hoping my lesson's like sympathetic magic. Like me _teaching_ this is going to make it happen all over again. A _cycle._ )

Our newfound appreciation for the culturally constructed nature of Western thought was pivotal to our decentering of Western worldviews and efforts to dismantle the ideologies underpinning racism and racist views of history (and colonialism).

For examples: In the 1800s, white men thought that _culture_ evolved, just like animals. They thought that Western culture was more "advanced" than non-Western culture. Like it was all survival of the fittest.

This kind of thinking fostered the most insidious forms of racism. Cultural and _physical_ genocide.

Masilowski helped us realize that this was bullshit. Helped us realize that Western culture was just one option. That culture didn't _evolve_ and that the application of scientific principles to history and culture was like comparing apples and oranges.

That didn't mean that we couldn't try to encourage democracy in place of a fascist theocracy. Or that we couldn't recommend a vaccine in addition to a prayer.

But it was complete bullshit to enslave a person or subject them to economic or cultural imperialism on the basis of this person's so-called cultural "inferiority," as if that had any objective meaning.

Thanks to Masilowski, historians threw out words like "progress" and "advancement" and the value judgments that justified colonialism. (Or at least they _should_ have.)

And then we saw Masilowski's diaries.

How— _how?_ —how could the man responsible for making the academy recognize its own prejudices and the degree to which these prejudices were undermining our scholarship be a racist?

 _Everyone's a little racist_.

Yes, everyone's at least a little racist. It's in our DNA.

It's evolutionarily advantageous to be able to recognize "your team" when you're out on the plains competing for wooly mammoths.

It is _not_ evolutionarily advantageous, however, to _reinforce_ that difference when multiculturalism and the cultivation of diversity is what makes America great.

So I'm a little racist. I don't deny it.

I didn't mean for this to happen though.

I didn't mean that immigrants should be deported.

I supported DACA when it was first proposed. I had arguments with people about it.

I have _never_ questioned the _American-ness_ of a person. You're here: Hate to break it to you, but you're an American. You're as much responsible for this shit as the rest of us.

It is possible to harbor racist inclinations and at the same time feel—with every fiber of your being—that the target of this racism is an _American_ who _deserves_ to be here and _deserves_ to be afforded a chance to thrive.

Yeah, I didn't _like_ them, but it wasn't because I thought they were all rapists, for instance. I never would've assigned so specific a crime, or indeed any crime at all. I just didn't like them.

And I knew that that was _my_ problem. I knew that it was irrational. I knew that I was prejudiced.

I thought that it was okay—

No, not quite okay—but I thought that it was _not so bad_ that I was prejudiced so long as I knew that I was wrong. Because I knew enough to fight against it. To try to suppress it.

But that's bullshit. Because I _avoided_ them, didn't I? I _purposely_ limited my contact with them.

So how the fuck was I supposed to really overcome my prejudice?

I was prejudiced—but I didn't mean for this to happen.

I didn't mean for Congress to throw billions of dollars away on a useless fucking wall or for the government to deport tax-payers who came here when they were six fucking years old.

I didn't mean for agents to start rounding people up, targeting women and kids, because the private prisons get more money for families than they do for individual men.

 _And the conditions of those prisons—good God._

I certainly didn't mean for ICE—fucking wannabe SS—to stake out courthouses so that they could arrest women who go there to report men for abusing them.

We've put a great big bright green neon " _ **RAPE ME**_ " sign over the heads of undocumented women—because a woman's not going to report a crime if she's going to be deported for going to court.

And it's so hard to convince women to go to the police in the first place.

I didn't mean for any of this.

 _What the fuck is wrong with me?_

I didn't vote for this.

Of _course_ I didn't.I voted _correctly_. The way that I was _supposed_ to vote.

It's not my fault that we didn't win.

But what—aside from casting a ballot—did I really do to stop any of this from happening?

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

" _We're just going to sit in here all day?" Edward asked._

 _Swan just shook her head, and opened her book again._

 _Edward knew that he wasn't being fair. Swan had been hard at work. She'd already tried trekking several miles in each direction, looking for any sign of civilization and, barring that, trying to find a signal on one of their phones. And she had created a giant sign in the snow, using branches to spell out the word "help."_

 _She had really done everything that could be done._

 _Meanwhile, Edward had sat in the little shelter she'd built, festering._

 _The fact that he could contribute nothing of any real value to their survival was particularly burdensome to him. So he reacted as would any arrogant seventeen year old who was completely incapacitated and put at the mercy of a lesser (to his mind) creature: He lashed out._

 _"You're going to sit in here and read?" he asked her._

 _Swan pulled on her headphones._

 _"I know they don't work," he said._

 _She ignored him._

 _"Hey," he called. "Stop ignoring me."_

 _She kept on reading._

 _And he, petulant in his impotency, closed his eyes and tried to sleep._

 _Several hours later, Edward humbly dined on canned beans, trying to think of a way to engage Swan in conversation._

" _When d'you think they'll find us?" he asked._

 _She shrugged._

" _They_ have _to be looking for us," he said._

" _Guess so," she murmured._

 _Buoyed by her reply, Edward asked about the wolves. "D'you think they'll come back tonight?"_

 _She looked askance._

" _What is it?" he asked._

" _I think that they finished with the pilot." She grimaced. "I went to look and—he was just." She paused. "They wouldn't just leave him, even in the daytime, unless they were finished with him, would they?"_

" _I don't know," Edward said._

" _I tried to bury him again," she told him. "But I felt sick. I had to stop."_

 _This evidence of vulnerability on Swan's part was oddly reassuring to Edward. He had been feeling like such a weakling, letting Swan do all of the work. And she seemed so—so_ robotic _. Like none of this was even phasing her. Like she didn't even care that they were stranded in the middle of nowhere._

" _I'm sure it's ok," Edward told her._

 _She gave a strange half-nod, as if she didn't really believe him, and then pulled her book towards her again._

" _Will you talk to me?" he blurted, the words just tumbling out of his mouth._

 _She looked at him wearily. "About what?"_

" _About anything. My leg's killing me. I need a distraction."_

 _She glanced down at her book, looking reluctant._

" _Who brings books on Spring Break anyhow?" Edward asked._

 _She glared at him._

" _I didn't mean it like that," Edward rushed to correct himself, though he had meant it_ just _like that. "I just mean—how can you read—now of all times?"_

" _What else is there to do?" she asked._

" _Will you read to me?"_

 _Swan shook her head._

" _Please."_

" _You won't like it."_

" _Why? Is it a diary?"_

" _No." She looked uncomfortable. "Not really."_

" _What is it then?"_

 _She pursed her lips—_

" _After everything we've been through, I think that you can trust me," Edward said._

 _It wasn't true, of course. There was no reason at all that Swan should've trusted him._

 _Nevertheless, she started reading:_ "Your hooves have stamped at the black margin of the wood."

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

A cop has pulled me over again. I speed too much, I know.

I'm watching him walk up to my car, my license and registration in hand.

Two years ago, cops in Harris County, Texas handcuffed a woman, threw her to the ground, threatened to break her legs, forced her legs apart, and fingered her for eleven minutes, supposedly searching for weed.

But I know this cop's not planning to do any of those things to me.

Because I'm white.

When I was sixteen—maybe seventeen—I pointed my finger at a cop like I was going to shoot him.

I was _supposed_ to be pulling a flier out of my backpack so that I could prove to the cop that school was opening late that day, and that I wasn't just skipping.

But instead of pulling out the flier, I pointed my finger at him like it was a gun and told him to stick his hands up.

 _I really was that stupid._

And he just laughed.

He fucking _laughed_ at me.

 _I was a complete and total fucking idiot._

I should've died that day.

I should've fucking drowned in a pool of my own blood. _And I would've deserved it._

But I'm white.

The cop who's pulled me over wants to know what I'm doing out of state. I tell him that I'm on a government grant, and that I'm teaching at the local high school.

"You're one of them teachers?" he asks.

I nod.

"Well, it's good of you to be giving up a better paying job to come out here. I do appreciate that, you know."

I shrug.

"My kid's a junior there. Don't suppose he's in your class though."

I don't recognize the name.

"Still," he says, "I think teachers and police should stick together, don't you?"

I'm not sure what he's getting at, but I tell him that my boyfriend's a cop.

"That so?"

I don't like the way he's looking at me. His eyes glittering like he knows something that I don't. Like I'm _complicit_ in the fucked up shit that dirty cops get away with, just because I'm dating a cop. Or maybe because I'm white, and thus benefit from white supremacy even without ever flashing a Confederate flag or a swastika.

He lets me off with a warning.

I can't tell if I should just be happy that I've avoided yet another ticket, or angry that he's made me a co-conspirator.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

 _It had been snowing for two days._

 _For two days the snow had come down, a whirl of whiteness making it impossible for Swan to venture more than a few feet from the shelter._

 _She had to keep tunneling a hole through the snow so that the smoke had a way to escape. They were running out of wood to burn, and the blizzard was making it difficult for Swan to go out looking for more._

 _Throughout it all, Swan read to Edward:_ "I saw the world, and yet I was not seen."

 _She read him poems. Epigrams. Ballads that she'd copied over into her book by hand. Sonnets and odes and elegies._

"What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow Out of this stony rubbish?"

 _When the light from the fire was too dim to read by, Edward realized that Swan had memorized most of the poems. She was reciting them by memory, whispering in his ear as they clung together for warmth, her lips sometimes stumbling over the words, so that she would go back a few lines to start again._

 _Finally, it stopped snowing._

 _But then the wolves started up._

 _They howled and howled._

 _And still Swan whispered into Edward's ear._

 _He thought at first that Swan had memorized nothing but sad poems. Poems all about death. But there was a tragic sort of stoicism about them too._

"I, being driven half insane

Because of some green wing, gathered old mummy wheat

In the mad abstract dark and ground it grain by grain."

 _Edward instinctually rebelled against the fatalism of so many verses._

 _At the same time, something inside of him understood—a quiet, hereto unknown part of him recognized something in those lines. An almost atavistic, unconscious knowledge that there was once a time when primitive men would have been able to somehow sense their fate—would_ know _what awaited them—and would accept it._

 _Yet a kind of wild hope lingered under the words, too._

"Man doth not yield himself to the angels, nor unto death utterly, save only through the weakness of his feeble will."

 _Almost as if there was something rebellious in accepting one's fate. In marching towards it. In_ daring _it to come to pass._

"The bloody ruin of flowers has committed me to live."

 _Edward could see what Swan saw in those lines._

"One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

 _There was fire, too, in some of them._

"The red rock wilderness

Shall be my dwelling-place."

 _Such a contradiction to the howling wind and chill air outside their shelter, and yet—_

" _I once thought that I would die in the desert," Swan told him at one point._

 _He thought that he had misheard her. Thought that she was just reciting a line from another poem. "What?"_

" _Do you ever think about when you'll die?" she asked him._

 _He shook his head. Because what seventeen year old thinks of death?_

 _A chorus of howls went up then. Edward imagined the wolves massing, circling just a few feet from the edge of their shelter, their shadows made monstrous by the light of the moon against the blanket of snow._

"Alone I sat and outside," _Swan started again._

"Waiting for the old one, the terrible Ase god, to come and look into the eye.

"'What do you want? What do you seek of me?'

"'I know where your eye is hidden, in Mimir's marvelous well. Mimir drinks mead every morning from Odin's eye."

"'What more do you know?'"

 _She paused, her head cocked to the side, as if listening for the sound of more wolves in the sudden quiet._

" _What does it mean?" Edward asked._

 _Of all the poems she'd recited, this one, he thought, was the strangest._

" _It's a test," Swan said._

" _A test?"_

" _Odin hanged himself," she explained. "For nine days and nine nights, he hung on a tree. And after that—"_

 _Edward waited. "And after that?"_

" _He knew everything that there was to know."_

 _Edward still didn't understand. "Like what?"_

 _The cry of a lone wolf pierced the quiet, and Swan pulled away from Edward at the noise, her eyes turning towards the entrance of their shelter as if waiting for it to be breached._

" _They thought that men could turn into bears," she said. "Did you know that? The word_ berserker _is for bear-skin. They thought that men turned into bears and fought one another."_

" _Good thing that you haven't seen any polar bears so far then," Edward joked half-heartedly, trying to reassure himself just as much as her._

" _They could turn into wolves, too," she said._

" _Who? The Vikings?"_

 _She nodded._

" _Well, if those are really men out there, they should come and help us." Edward knew damn well how that sounded._

 _But none of this was normal, was it?_

" _It doesn't work like that," Swan said._

" _What?"_

" _The battle frenzy. Once a man is in it—he doesn't change back into a man until he's been sated."_

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

They found swastikas on campus today.

I only know about it because I went on Facebook during lunch.

I fucking hate Facebook—I can't figure how to use it and my "friends" only post pictures of cats—but I went on today because I realized that I had missed an old coworker's birthday.

And there it is in my feed: _Swastikas found on the University of Maryland, College Park Campus_.

Straight away, I start clicking, looking for other graduate students in the History department, students that are still there, on campus, and haven't graduated, like me.

I find the page for the student government association and there's a post about the swastikas. There's a bunch of comments.

It looks like there's going to be some sort of rally. Some of the students are talking about walking out.

I add a comment: _I'm in T— right now,_ I say. _So I don't know what I can do from here, but I support you._

After I click _Post_ , it occurs to me that my comment isn't strong enough. That I should've said more.

But it would be weird to add another comment now. And I feel like an asshole, telling them what to do, ordering them around, all of the way from here, especially when I was never really a part of the grad student clique. I only went to two student government meetings.

I helped at the book sales though, and even lent them a dolly, which I never got back.

I add another comment: _Please do something._

The bell rings then, and students start trickling into class.

Today, I'm teaching the origin of the KKK, which means that I'm also talking about that movie _Birth of the Nation_.

"Can we see it?" L— asks.

I hate this girl. It's occurred to me that what I interpret as her being a bitch is her just trying to be cool in front of her friends. But I still hate her.

She's always asking if we can watch movies.

I tell her _no_.

"But you said it was such a great movie," G— argues.

I hate this boy even more than I hate L—. Such a _supercilious_ little punk. And he _knows_ it.

"I said it was great _aesthetically_ ," I say.

"I don't know what that word means," L— says.

And I feel like an asshole.

"That means _artistically._ It was a very innovative movie in terms of cinematography. In shooting action, for instance. It was the first time a movie had sprawling, epic scenes."

"So why can't we watch?" G— wants to know.

"Not in my classroom," I tell him.

"You know that you're just making us want to see it even more?" G— points out.

"I know it," I say.

But over my dead fucking body will I provide access to fucking KKK propaganda.

I ask them about the more recent film by the same name, the one about about Nat Turner's rebellion.

"Why would Hollywood do that?" I ask. "Why would they make a movie about a slave rebellion and use the same title as a movie that helped to inspire a resurgence—a _rebirth_ —of the KKK?"

The class just looks back at me.

I know that they're not this dumb.

They just hate me.

I open my mouth to ask them if they don't understand the question, if they need it rephrased, but then I stop.

They understand the question. I know they do. They're just fucking with me the way that they always fuck with me.

Yesterday, G— interrupted me twenty times.

Twenty times. I counted.

And A— spent the entire class period folding pieces of paper into little triangles and flicking them at M—.

And L— asked me three times if we could watch a movie.

I couldn't help it—I lost my temper. G— interrupted me _again,_ for the twenty- _first_ time, and I snapped. "Are you physically capable of holding your tongue?" I asked. "Like do you _have_ the ability, or not?" (Leaving aside the fact that this was ableist as hell, it was bad teaching.) Not waiting for him to respond, I continued teaching the lesson. And out of the corner of my eye, I watched G— get up and walk to the board. He wrote a list: _People who aren't allowed to talk_. In that list, he wrote his name, along with A—'s and L—'s, and at the very bottom, in very small print, he wrote my name.

And I just let him. I was so fucking shocked that I didn't say a damn thing.

Teaching here is _nothing_ like my experience teaching at a college.

I know teachers who walk out of a college class if students haven't done the reading.

I've never walked out of a class. I can't imagine doing so.

But the _way_ these students treat me—

I have _no_ idea what I'm doing.

I'm not going to give into them this time, though. I'm not going to let them play me. I'm just going to sit here not saying a fucking word, until they _ANSWER THE FUCKING QUESTION._

We sit there for another ten minutes until the class ends, no one saying a goddamn word.

 _I hate them._

The last class of the day goes off without a hitch. I'm so grateful that they're not the assholes from fourth period. I'm so happy that I won't have to see those assholes again until next week.

So when, ten minutes after the final bell, L— walks up to my desk to talk to me, I feel like telling her to get the fuck out of my classroom.

But I keep my cool and she explains that she's come to see me about the paper she's writing.

"I just don't see why I have to write it your way," she says. "You said it was our choice. But I don't feel like you're letting it be my choice."

"It _is_ your choice," I say. "You have to problematize it though."

"I don't know what that means."

Most of the time, I'm grateful that L— has the courage to tell me when something doesn't make sense to her.

Sometimes, however, I think she's just fucking with me.

"You have to make a _problem_ out of it," I explain. "Your paper has to be more than _description_. There has to be at least two sides. The answer can't be obvious. Otherwise, it's just an English paper. And this is History."

"I don't want to talk about racism though. I don't think racism has anything to do with it."

I want to scream. Because you'd have to be living at the bottom of the ocean to honestly think that racism has nothing to do with this.

"That's fine," I lie. "You're allowed to think that." _I'm a teacher, so I have no choice but to say this._ "But a large portion of the country disagrees with you." Maybe I should tell her that _I_ disagree with her. I don't want to scare her though—I want her to write this paper and actually grapple with the issue. I'm actually hoping that she'll see the light. "So you have to talk about the reasons that they disagree with you."

"But it's _my_ paper."

She _can't_ be this fucking stupid. She _can't_ be. Does she really not realize what a big issue this is? That at least half the fucking country thinks she's wrong?

"It would be _weird_ , though, to talk about the Confederate flag without talking about racism because _so many people_ think it _is_ about racism."

(She calls it the _rebel flag_ , which implies a whiff of respectability, in a country built on rebellion, but there's no way in hell I'm using that term.)

She shrugs. "They're wrong."

"So explain how and why they're wrong. The best argument engages your opponent. You'll be more convincing if you give the other side a fighting chance."

She looks skeptical, but at least she's thinking about it. "I just don't see why everything has to be about race," she says. "Like I don't see a person's skin color. I just treat them like people. Why can't we all do that?"

She's lying. I know she's lying.

Or else she's fucking naïve.

No, she's not that fucking naïve. I made them all take the Harvard Implicit Bias Test. She _knows_ that she's lying.

"People _are_ different though," I tell her. "And if you ignore race, it all just defaults to the dominant group. To whites."

I can tell she doesn't believe me. Or at least that she doesn't _want_ to believe me.

She points to one of the comments I wrote on her paper. "I don't understand what this means."

I reread what I wrote: _To do what?_

"Well," I say, "you argue that the flag just means that 'The south will rise again.' I want you to explain what that means."

She shrugs again. "It just means what it means. To rise again."

"To do what?"

She stares at me.

"The south will rise again—to do what?" I ask.

She doesn't answer.

"To _enslave_ people?" I ask, because _Come the fuck on_.

"Of _course_ not," she says, with this tone of indignation, like I've insulted her.

"Well, that's what they were doing the last time around," I say, very fucking close to snapping.

She's shaking her head. "The war was about states' rights and the economy—"

And I am Def-Con fucking nuclear, because I already went through all of this with them.

"Put that in your paper," I say carefully, not letting my temper show. "Add a paragraph about the argument over the source of the war— _but you have to put in both sides!_ —and justify your argument. Then use that to explain what the south intends to do once it rises again. What _you_ think it intends to do with its power. Explain what that phrase means."

She looks thoughtful. Like she's finally gotten it.

Which of course she hasn't.

Because I'm a horrible fucking teacher.

And there _aren't_ two sides.

And the students already know what I think about this. I didn't hide it from them.

How could I hide my perspective, when I'm not just trying to teach history, I'm also trying to teach historiography? I'm trying to get them to understand that our view of the past changes based on what we're going through right now, and that that matters.

But to them, that just means that _everything's an opinion_.

In the effort to show them how to make themselves more objective by identifying and isolating their own bias, I'm afraid that I've inadvertently reinforced their notion that there's no such thing as facts.

Fact: The war was about slavery.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

 _Where was she?_

 _She should've been back by now?_

 _Swan had been gone for hours. It was getting dark._

Fuck _._

 _It was_ his _fault. Edward had fucked up, again._

 _He had been talking about his parents. Saying that he was sure that they were looking for him._

" _What about you?" he asked. "Aren't you staying on LaPush?"_

 _Swan hitched a shoulder._

" _Billy Black. Isn't that who you're staying with?"_

 _She nodded._

" _He'll be looking for you, won't he?"_

" _Doubt it," she huffed._

 _Edward looked at her. "Come on, I'm sure he's worried."_

 _Swan chuckled. "You don't know anything about me. You don't know anything about my life. We're not friends. Stop pretending otherwise."_

 _And she got up and left._

 _He was pissed. But he had a right to be pissed, didn't he?_

 _After everything they'd been through, he thought that he deserved to be treated with—_

 _With what?_

 _Respect. Common fucking courtesy._

 _They_ weren't _friends, but they were—_

Why weren't they friends? _Why couldn't they be?_

 _Well, if that was the way she felt, then fuck her._

 _When Swan returned to the shelter an hour later, she found Edward in a far more relaxed state than she'd left him._

" _Wazzup?" he drawled._

" _What're you doing?" she demanded._

" _Waz it loo— like?" he waved the bottle at her. "Loo— what I found."_

" _You're drunk."_

" _You wan' some?"_

 _She just looked at him._

" _Com'on," he slurred. "It'll warm you up."_

 _Glancing down at Edward's lap, Swan hissed. "What're you doing?!"_

 _She reached for her diary, but he pulled it out of her reach. "Reading," he told her._

 _And oh, what things he had been reading._

 _He thought it was just a collection of poetry. But no, it was far more than that._

 _Edward started reading aloud: "'I would kee' my head above wader, neber come to their attention by being purrfect.'" Edward paused to belch. "'Could—no,_ would _—would neber get to de point where I would haf to fight. So it's stoopid to ask myself whether I can live dere way.'" He stopped and looked at her._

" _Give it to me," Swan ordered._

" _Whose way?" he asked. "Waddyou mean it's stoopid?"_

 _Not answering, Swan shoved roughly at his broken leg. Even in his inebriated state, Edward couldn't help doubling over in pain, giving Swan an opportunity to retrieve her diary_ and _the bottle of liquor._

" _You din't haf to do dat," he gasped._

 _But she was already gone._

 _Hours passed. Long enough for Edward to sober up and realize what he had done._

 _And by the time that the shadows had started to lengthen on the snow, the panic really began to set in._

 _Edward dragged himself to the makeshift door in the side of the shelter and peered out into the snow._

" _Swan!" he yelled, scanning the white expanse, looking for any sign of his companion._

" _Goddammit," he cursed. "I'm sorry!" he yelled._

 _But nothing stirred._

 _Using the tree limb that Swan had given to him to use as a sort of crutch, Edward leveraged himself up onto his feet. Wincing at the pain, he hobbled out of the shelter._

 _He had come outside before, of course, to relieve himself. But otherwise, he hadn't stepped outside in days._

Days _._

 _To be honest, he couldn't even remember how long they had been stranded out there._

 _Gazing down, he studied the series of tracks, trying to decide which way Swan would've gone._

 _Fortunately, it had been snowing again that morning, so he trace her movements easily enough. She had gone to the end of the plane—to the area they were using as a bathroom—and then circled back. She had ventured toward the front of the plane as well, obviously going up into the cockpit. He figured that she'd been sitting inside of the plane earlier._

 _But Edward was fairly certain that she wasn't there now._

 _Following a lone set of footprints that led off beyond the front of the plane, Edward trudged through the snow, struggling to keep his footing._

 _He hoped that she hadn't gone far—because he didn't think that he would be able to make it back to the plane before nightfall with her if he had to go more than—_

 _His heart stopped in his chest._

" _Get back!" he yelled, waving an arm and stumbling forward._

 _The wolf snarled at him, but backed away, leaving Swan where she lay crumpled in the snow._

 _Collapsing in the snow next to her, Edward turned her over. "Swan!"_

 _Her face was blue._

 _He felt for the pulse in her neck and was relieved to feel that it was still there, albeit barely._

 _He was even more relieved to see her eyelids fluttering._

 _But when her eyes opened, he could tell that something was wrong. Her pupils were far too large._

 _Quickly, scanning her body for injuries, Edward couldn't see any wounds. There was no blood._

 _Then he caught sight of the bottle of pills lying in the snow._

" _What the fuck?" Picking up the bottle, Edward was shocked to see a label for Percocet. The medication was prescribed for William Black._

" _Are you fucking kidding me?"_

 _Edward couldn't believe that Swan would do this to him. First, that she would keep these pills from him. And then that she would—_

Fuck! What had she done?

 _Turning her over again, so that she was facedown, Edward shoved a finger down her throat._

" _Throw it up," he ordered her._

 _She heaved in his arms, choking._

" _Throw up!" he demanded._

 _Gagging around his fingers, Swan began to vomit the pills she'd swallowed. Edward pulled his finger away and held her head in place as she continued to vomit._

" _Is that all of them?" he asked, trying to count the partially dissolved pills he spied in the snow._

 _Swan coughed._

 _He shook her. "Is that_ all _of them?" he asked again._

" _I think so," she panted, beginning to cry weakly._

" _What the fuck is wrong with you?" Edward wanted to know, pulling away from her._

 _Washing his hand off with snow, he stared ruefully at the remains of the pills. And yeah, part of him wondered if he could somehow salvage them. Lord knew that his leg was killing him._

" _Fuck," he cursed again, not knowing if he was angrier at Swan for trying to kill herself or for keeping the Percocet from him._

 _That was when he realized that he truly was a selfish bastard._

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

There's been an update in the court case against Freddie Gray's killers.

The news is on the radio as Edward pulls up and parks. We're having dinner tonight with Edward's boss and his boss' wife. I know tonight is important to Edward. But I still have trouble making conversation with strangers, avoiding those awkward moments when I don't understand what I'm expected to do or say.

And I can't get the news about the trial out of my head. I'm just so—

And here I am, dating a cop. I still haven't come to grips with that.

I promise myself that I won't bring it up tonight. I _won't_.

But it's like a fucking _itch_.

I _can't_ help it.

So, after the appetizer, I say, casual like, "Have you heard anything about Baltimore?"

Edward looks at me, confused.

"The trial," I explain. "About the police officers who killed Freddie Gray. Do you think there'll be more riots?"

 _Rioting._ I don't like that word. _They ought to call it 'mourning.'_

I was TAing when Freddie Gray. I had a student who couldn't come to class because of the _mourning._

His boss' wife tsks and says: "Those Black Lives Matter people are just making things worse."

Now _that_ I hadn't expected.

Which was probably stupid of me.

I was looking forward to a great show of virtue signaling. I expected Edward's boss and his wife to act properly abashed. Because a sane white person—especially a cop and his wife—should be fucking _mortified_ that black people keep being murdered with zero fucking repercussions.

But no. Guess not.

I look at her. "What do you mean?"

She shrugs. "Those rioters are just taking advantage of the situation."

I'm quiet for a minute, thinking her words over, trying to decide how angry to be.

Edward, of course, who knows just what I'm thinking, decides to pretend that my silence means that I'm satisfied with her answer, and starts talking football—

But I am having _none_ of that.

So _what_ if this is Edward's boss and his boss' wife? So _what_?

And if this makes me a bad girlfriend—well then, better that then be a fucking accomplice through my fucking silence.

So I repeat my question: "What do you mean?"

She blinks at me.

"About Black Lives Matter," I clarify.

"They encourage people not to trust the police," she says.

And I hold my tongue again while I mull _that_ over.

For a few brief seconds, I even consider letting it the fuck go. Just not saying another fucking word, because it's clear we aren't on the same page and aren't going to be on the same page for a long fucking time.

And this _is_ the wife of Edward's boss.

But if I hold my tongue, doesn't that make me complicit?

Of course, commonsense would tell me to keep my mouth shut.

And yet, the last time I let commonsense get in the way of my rage, I was stuck on an island with two traitorous, back-stabbing friends.

 _Never again_.

I say: "I think cops killing blacks for no reason is what encourages people not to trust cops."

Edward drops his fork and his boss starts coughing.

But the wife is in fighting form. "And Black Lives Matter is going to help?" she wants to know. "How?"

"By bringing attention to the situation."

"With violence!"

"With _peaceful_ marches that become violent when the police provoke violence," I snap.

She snorts.

"What about the Women's March?" I ask. "There were no arrests."

"Exactly," she says. "You proved my point. Black Lives Matter protesters _provoke_ arrests."

"Are you kidding me?" I can't believe what I'm hearing. "If anything, the Women's March just proves that white women should've been marching with Black Lives Matter all along. It just proves that we _abandoned_ them, white women like you and me. If we had been there with them, the cops would've left them alone."

She's shaking her head. "You've got it all wrong. Black Lives Matter is like the Black Panthers. They're violent for the sake of being violent."

"The Black Panthers fed _kids_ ," I correct her. "They ran clinics to get people tested for Sickle Cell Anemia."

"They killed federal agents," she replies, with this tone of utter dismay in her voice, like she can't believe what I'm saying.

" _Did_ they?" I ask. "Or were they set up?" I really don't know the answer to this question, not having researched it thoroughly. But it seems clear that there was indeed some fishy shit going down.

"Are you _insane_?" She's moved straight from dismay to anger.

"The FBI tried to get MLK to kill himself. They tried to frame him as a Communist."

"It's not the same thing."

"Are you telling me that black lives _don't_ matter?"

" _Everyone's_ life matters," she snaps, all arrogance now, all self-righteous, self-important judgment.

" _Clearly_ that isn't true, because cops keep killing black kids!" I hiss.

"Does your _boyfriend_ kill black kids?" she retorts.

I open my mouth to reply—

And I just sit there, with my jaw hanging open.

Not because I don't love Edward.

But because he is human. And humans make mistakes.

If he was the one who shot Tamir Rice, could I still love him?

He _wouldn't_. He _couldn't._

Could he?

 _He's_ one _of them, isn't he?_

But I love him.

 _He couldn't_.

He wouldn't—because I couldn't love him if he did. I wouldn't be able to look at him.

 _Is that true?_

He's been _trained_. And he's not racist—

 _Everyone has implicit biases._

He wouldn't make a mistake like that.

 _I want to believe that._

But I still haven't said a word.

"She's just very passionate," Edward says, making excuses for me. Then he goes on this long spiel about the training that his department receives on how to avoid racial profiling and how to manage stress and deescalate tense situations.

I suppose he's using some of the latter right now.

When he's done, I apologize, even though I'm not sorry, not at all. I meant every word that I said.

I say: "I'm sorry that I was so aggressive. Even after all of this time, I'm still just so heartbroken by that video of Tamir Rice being shot." I'm twisting the napkin in my fingers, my chest tight. And I can see it in my head: That cop getting out of his car and taking aim at Tamir. The cop didn't even wait three fucking seconds. "Tamir was just a child. I can't imagine how I would feel if he was my brother."

The bitch nods and says that she sees my point, but that she's sure that the officer really thought that he was doing the right thing.

I want to carve her fucking eyes out.

But I let Edward change the subject.

 _Because I'm a fucking sheep._

I'm also a bad girlfriend. Yet it's the part about being a fucking sheep that bothers me more.

Which probably makes me an even shittier girlfriend. It seems to me, though, that you have to make decisions in life, for better or worse.

You have to pick a goddamn side.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

" _You can tell which way is south," Edward said, "because the sun rises in the east and sets in the west."_

" _Why south?" Swan asked, looking dubious._

" _Because south is naturally warmer than north," he explained._

 _She shook her head. "I don't think this is a good idea. I think we should stay with the plane."_

" _Unfortunately, the person who doesn't care if she lives or dies doesn't get a vote."_

 _Edward was being harsh, but he didn't care. Ever since he'd found Swan half-dead in the snow, he had been riding her._

 _Not like before—not like when they first crashed. Not like when they were back in Forks._

 _No, if he was riding her now it was because he was afraid of what she'd do to herself when he wasn't paying attention._

 _She had yet to give him an explanation._

 _He had pleaded and cajoled. But she had held her tongue, refusing to explain or justify herself._

 _He had asked her about her father. "Is it because he died?" Edward asked._

 _He had asked her about Billy. "Is he an asshole?" Edward asked._

 _He had asked her about school. "Is it because of_ us _? Is it because_ we're _such assholes?"_

 _Still, she held her tongue._

 _Edward had taken to following her whenever she left the shelter, limping behind her on his makeshift crutch._

 _This made for some vicious arguments over the use of the bathroom—arguments that Swan had won—but Edward just couldn't bear the possibility that she'd try to hurt herself again._

 _He had apologized for reading her diary and getting drunk._

 _He had apologized for every shitty thing that he had ever done to her._

 _She had finally told him to stop it. "I can't stand to hear any more," she told him._

" _So tell me why you did it," he said._

" _Because," she snapped. "Just because."_

" _That's a shitty reason," he told her._

" _Yeah, well it's a shitty world," she replied._

 _Yes, it_ was _a shitty world._

 _They had been stranded for_ weeks _. They were running out of food._

 _And the wolves had started coming back._

 _Which was when Edward decided that they had no choice but to try to hike their way out._

" _You can't even walk," Swan reminded him._

" _I can hobble," he told her._

" _It took me_ hours _just to go out of sight of the plane," she replied, reminding him how she had already tried looking for help._

" _What choice have we got?" he asked._

 _At last, he convinced Swan that they had no option but to try to make it out of there on their own. Unfortunately, by then, Edward was in no shape to travel._

" _I just need a few hours," he said, coughing again._

" _You're sick," Swan said, stating the obvious._

" _Well, I'm not going to get any better sitting here." Edward pulled his coat tighter around him. He was shivering even though it was the middle of the day._

 _She stared at him. "You wouldn't last an hour."_

" _If we stay here, we're going to die."_

 _Swan refused to concede. "There's another option."_

" _What?"_

"You _stay, and I go get help."_

 _Coughing again, Edward shook his head. "Are you kidding me?"_

" _I'm serious."_

" _Absolutely not."_

" _I can do it," Swan said, a note of determination in her voice as she met his eyes._

" _Like I can trust you," he huffed._

 _A look of pain passed over her features, and was gone, replaced by a steely resolve. "You_ can. _You can trust me."_

" _Why should I?"_

 _She looked lost for words for a moment. Then, reaching for her diary, she handed it to him. "Because I want this back."_

 _Eyeing the book, Edward mulled her offer._

" _If you go," he said, "you have to take the lighter."_

" _But you'll have to keep the fire burning here," she reminded him._

 _They'd had to use the lighter multiple times to relight the fire. It was difficult to keep it burning. And the fuel was running low._

" _You'll need it more than me," Edward said._

" _Fine."_

 _So Swan put together a pack with food and blankets. As much as she could carry._

" _South," Edward told her._

 _She nodded. "South."_

 _She set out at first light._

 _And five days later, Edward was rescued._

 _By this point, his cough was so bad that it felt like his lungs were on fire. He was feverish, too, dipping in and out of sleep as he fought to stay conscious enough to keep the fire lit._

 _At night, he could hear the wolves howling outside._

 _He wondered how far Swan had made it that day._

 _He told himself that she would be safe from any wolves. She had the lighter. And as long as she had a fire every night, she would be alright._

 _As long as no polar bears found her._

 _As long as those wolves didn't decide that they were especially hungry._

 _Edward tried to stay awake by memorizing the poems he found in the diary._

"The seven-branched cactus  
Will never sweat wine;  
My own bleeding feet  
Shall furnish the sign."

 _That poem reminded him of Swan, out there, trudging through the snow._

 _He hoped that she was alright, wherever she was._

She's alright, _he told himself._

 _Shivering with fever, he tried to read, the words blurring as his eyes ran._

 _At first, Edward shied away from the more personal passages, the entries that were obviously not a poem but were Swan's own thoughts. He felt like it was an intrusion._

 _But she had left the diary with him._

 _And he wanted to know why she had done it. Why she had tried to hurt herself._

 _So he was frustrated by how vague all of the references were. Most of the time, he couldn't tell what she was talking about._

 _He could tell that she was gravely unhappy though._

 _Uneasy, Edward turned back to the poetry._

"For the world's more full of weeping than ye can understand."

 _In the midst of such despair, Edward was surprised to find more frivolous stuff._

"Queenie was a blonde and her age stood still,  
And she danced twice a day in vaudeville.  
Grey eyes.  
Lips like coals aglow.  
Her face was a tinted mask of snow.  
What hips—  
What shoulders—  
What a back she had!  
Her legs were built to drive men mad.

And she did."

 _The passage spoke of a gaiety that seemed out of sync with the rest. Out of sync with what Edward knew of Swan._

 _Of Bella._

 _The rest of the poem was like that, too. Gay and wild. And vicious. Angry._

 _Rough._

Such debauchery, _Edward thought idly, picturing the decadent revelry described in the poem._ Bella's probably never been to a party like this, _he thought._ She's probably never even been to a real party.

 _She had been persona non grata, even before Tyler's arrest. No one wanted to risk inviting the Chief's displeasure._

I'll invite her to a party, _he told himself._ When we get back. A _real_ one.

 _But he never got his chance._

 _He was unconscious when they found him. The fire he'd built was down to embers. He hadn't eaten in nearly two days._

 _They airlifted him to the nearest hospital. The doctors warned his parents that he might not recover._

 _The first twenty-four hours was touch-and-go._

 _When he finally opened his eyes three days later, he was still feverish. It was hard for him to stay awake. Even so, he demanded to see Swan right away._

" _Where is she?" he asked, confused by their hesitancy. By their careful looks._

" _We were hoping you could tell us," his father told him._

 _Swan was still lost._

 _It took Edward a year to regain full use of his leg. And even then, he walked with a limp and still struggled with pain._

 _Nevertheless, he was adamant about his plans._

 _He was going to find Swan, wherever she was._

 _Edward's parents argued with him that it was a waste of time. Trained professionals had spent months looking for her, and turned up nothing._

 _He was determined, though. Not even Billy Black could convince him to give up. If anything, it made him even angrier that so many people were trying to dissuade him from looking._

" _Don't you want her found?" he asked Billy at last._

 _Horrified, Billy gaped at him. "Of course I do. She's like my daughter."_

 _Edward smirked. "Like your daughter? Ha! You know nothing about her."_

" _And you do?" Billy asked. "I know about you. You were never her friend."_

" _I_ knew _her," Edward insisted. "I knew her better than you."_

 _Billy smiled softly. "And I'm glad that you were there for her in the end—"_

" _You're damn right I was," Edward snapped. "I saved her life. She tried to kill herself. Did you know that?"_

 _Naturally, Billy knew nothing of Bella's effort to take her own life. But he knew that she was depressed._

 _And to Billy—and to Edward's parents—this was even more proof that Edward's quest to find Bella was futile._

" _You need to let her go," they told him._

 _He spent six months trekking back and forth, crisscrossing the territory that Bella should've travelled on her way south._

 _Edward didn't find any sign of her, but now and then he would come across the occasional hunter._

 _He would ask them about Bella. Ask if there was any chance that someone had come across a seventeen year old girl—_

 _They always shook their head. Said she'd probably frozen to death. Or been taken by a polar bear._

 _Eventually, Edward had no choice but to give up. He went home. He even enrolled in college, to make his parents happy._

 _But every summer, he'd return north to look for her again._

 _One summer, he happened to meet up with a native trapper._

 _As usual, he asked about Bella. As usual, he was told that she was probably dead._

 _This time, however, Edward asked the trapper if he would mind it if Edward spent the night in his camp._

 _They stayed up late trading stories. It was something of a custom to tell wild tales in those parts. Edward imagined that it was a way of passing the time in the long cold nights. He had picked up a few of the stories himself, and was a fairly good raconteur._

 _Nothing, however, could compare to the story that the trapper told him that night._

" _The wolves," the trapper said, "are not always wolves. Sometimes they are more than wolves."_

" _More than wolves?" Edward joked._

" _Sometimes they're people," the trapper explained._

 _For some reason, struck by the trapper's words, Edward found himself studying the darkness just beyond the fire's light._

" _There are some wolves that can turn into people. And people into wolves." The trapper cleared his throat. "Or so the stories go."_

" _I heard a story like that, too," Edward said. "Once."_

" _Oh really?"_

"She _told it to me. The one I told you about."_

 _The trapper was quiet for a minute. "Maybe she was one of them."_

 _More disturbed than he wanted to admit, Edward bid the trapper a goodnight and took to his sleeping bag._

 _He was tired. But he found it difficult to sleep._

 _After a while, he found himself drifting in and out of sleep._

 _He was conscious of the sounds around him as he slept. It was almost as if there were people, moving and speaking around the fire._

 _He dreamt that a pack of wolves had surrounded the fire, and that they were talking to each other._

 _Panicking, Edward tried to move, but he felt weighted down. He ached, too. Every muscle ached. And his chest burned—burned like it had all of those years ago—when he was laying in that hospital near death. His leg felt newly broken, throbbing and pulsing with pain._

" _You're awake."_

 _Blinking, Edward stared at his mother._

" _Oh, Carlisle, he's awake!"_

" _Mom?" Edward asked, scanning the room. He was back in the hospital._ How?

" _Now don't try to move, Edward," his father said. "We've found you. And the plane. You were airlifted to a hospital and you've been in and out of sleep for three days."_

" _What?"_

 _Was it really possible? Had Edward dreamt everything since his rescue?_

 _Where was Bella?_

" _Swan?" Edward asked, afraid to hope. "Is she here?"_

" _She's in the room next door."_

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

I'm so sick.

I'm sick to my stomach and I can't sleep and I've had two beers and I still can't sleep.

I'm _drinking_ —me. I _never_ drink.

But I'm just so upset. So _wracked_ with anger and frustration and _sick_ to my stomach with what I heard today.

I actually thought that I was making some progress with my students.

And I'm not brainwashing them—I'm not. I'm just giving them the facts.

For instance, when we did the New Deal, I gave them the proposed 2018 budget from the White House. I let them see for themselves just how badly they were being screwed over. How rural areas—like this town—and students, in particular, were getting royally fucked. I didn't _tell_ them that they were getting fucked. I let them figure it out for themselves. And they did.

When we were doing the Red Scare(s), I gave them graphs showing the proportion of crimes being committed in the America today by Muslims and undocumented immigrants compared to everyone else. I didn't _tell_ them what to think. I let them read the numbers and draw their own conclusions. _White Christian men are the greatest domestic threat._

I showed them pictures of crops in California that weren't getting picked because the undocumented workers were fleeing. Not that wage slavery is alright, but it's bullshit to accuse undocumented workers of taking jobs from whites.

"What's that going to do to food prices?" I asked them, pointing to the rotting crops. I didn't _tell_ them what to think. I just asked questions.

I thought that I was making progress.

I was especially proud of this week's lesson plan. I had them reading letters and diaries written by the Freedom Summer workers. Then I told them to put themselves in the place of the workers and come up with their own plans and propaganda materials for a voter registration drive.

Some of them took it seriously, I could tell. Some of them were honestly working the problem.

But most of them just wasted their time. Sat there talking about anything and everything, just so long as it had nothing to do with thinking about how to overcome the very real modern-day problems of systematic disenfranchising a person based on the color of his skin. The challenges faced by anyone wanting to register voters in a town where a person would be recognized as an outsider just by his accent—the way I was here—and then targeted, possibly lynched. The contingency plans required for activists facing the possibility of violence and arrest just for trying to help people exercise their constitutional right to vote. The internal contradiction of paternalism possibly overshadowing the desire to use one's privilege to help, to do the right thing, in the midst of so much grinding poverty.

I was so proud of my lesson plan. I made all of the photocopies on my own dime. I gave my students two whole days to work on it. I went around the room helping them, making sure that they were getting it.

For nothing.

 _What if it was you?_ I asked them. _What strategies did they use? Why did it work?_

And yeah, maybe I was secretly hoping that they would learn how to stage their own revolution in the process. But so what?

We did Brown versus the Board of Education and MLK's _Letter from a Birmingham Jail_ and Rosa Parks and the Freedom Rides and the Greensboro lunch counter sit-ins.

We had already talked about the Stonewall Riots—because for some reason the curriculum was set up to go all of the way up to the eighties and then swing back and do black civil rights all at once—and at the time some of the boys had said "Maybe it _is_ violating a person's rights to make them serve gay couples," and I just didn't know what to say to that. It was so—I couldn't find the words. So I'd said "Let's come back to this when we do the Greensboro lunch counter sit-ins.

And we did. We did the Greensboro lunch counter sit-ins and I said, "Remember the Stonewall Riots, and some of you asked if it was maybe violating a person's rights to make them serve everyone? Well look what happened here." And they all nodded their heads, like they got it, like they _agreed._ Like they _understood_ that bigotry was bigotry. That it wasn't ok.

I even showed them how racists were using the Bible to defend racism back in the sixties.

The implication being that, by corollary, it was just as wrong to use religion nowadays to defend discrimination against homosexuals.

I didn't spell it out though. I wasn't sure if I _could_ spell it out. If this were a college campus, I would have. But this was a public high school, and every one of my students spent their Sundays in church. I knew that I _could_ just come out and saythem that a God who preached hate wasn't a God. But I _implied_ it.

And I think they understood.

Then it happened.

Today, I was covering the radicalization of the civil rights movement. The Deacons for Defense and Justice. James Meredith being shot during a March against Fear. Stokely Carmichael being arrested at the end of the march, and then coming out of jail talking about "black power."

I defined "black power" very carefully. I said that it meant the use of collective power to fight for economic and political causes.

We had already debated the pros and cons of opening up membership of an advocacy group. We talked about it when covering the labor struggle. I thought they understood: "Teaming up makes you stronger, because it gives you more numbers."( _Minorities aren't the reason you're poor_.) "But teaming up also dilutes your message, because you have to accommodate different interests." ( _So you have to cultivate intersectionality._ )

I thought that they got it. It was a balancing act. Different strategies for different purposes. And sometimes the use of multiple strategies by different groups was the reason that a larger movement succeeded.

I had them read quotes from Stokely Carmichael: It wasn't about black _supremacy_. It was blacks fighting for their fucking lives.

Then we did the Nation of Islam.

"Would the civil rights movement have been as successful as it was without Malcolm X?" I asked.

In other words: _Did he_ scare _them into embracing MLK?_

They didn't really have much to say about that.

But then I made them read Malcolm X's statements on white allies. On integration. On tokenism.

I thought they understood.

They were nodding their fucking heads.

Then we did the Black Panthers.

And when we were finally done, I went back over all of the strategies: The NAACP versus SNCC versus the Nation of Islam versus CORE versus the SCLC versus the Black Panthers. _Why was strategy each effective or not effective?_ The entire lesson plan a covert training in how to fix the country.

And at the end of class, I held my fist up and asked them what it meant. Out of a five period school day, of which I teach four classes, three of the classes understand. Three of them got it.

In the fourth one, though, M— said: "Black supremacy."

"What?" I asked. By which I meant, _What the fuck?_

 _What the actual fuck?_

He just sat through an entire fucking lesson about how it did _not_ mean that.

To be fair, he amended his answer then. "Black power," he said.

I went to the next slide in the PowerPoint, a picture of those black Olympic victors, with their fists in a black power salute, next to another picture, this one of white supremacists behind the press podium of the White House, doing the white power "ok" hand sign.

"Why is one of these gestures positive, and not the other?" I asked.

Out of the four classes I taught today, three of them understood. Three of them got it.

In the fourth one—

M— was actually aghast. _Aghast._ "Wait, why is white power not okay?" he asked, genuinely taken aback.

"Why is it not okay?" I replied, not even holding back, because I was so fucking shocked. Because I kind of thought it was a joke. Because he couldn't have been serious.

"Yeah, why not?" And his friends were all nodding their heads, like they agreed.

But the bell was about to ring and I didn't have time for this bullshit.

"Are you kidding me?" I asked.

One of his friends joins in: "What's really wrong with a white power parade?"

A _white power parade_.

"It's not like there's real racism anymore," M— said.

I couldn't help it. I laughed. I said: "There's systematic economic and political disenfranchisement of blacks."

"In 2017?" he asked.

"Yes," I said, "in 2017, there's systematic economic and political disenfranchisement."

Then the bell rang.

The fucking bell rang—

And they all walked out.

And there I was, still all ramped up, ready to go a round.

Turned out, I wasn't alone in that.

I was sitting at my desk after school, grading, when the _dean of students_ walked in and wanted to have a chat. Apparently, M— and his little friends walked into her class after leaving my room, and they were still complaining about me and what I had said and done.

So here was the dean of fucking students is in my face because some racist little fucks don't realize how fucking racist they were.

Some racists realized that they were racist and that's somehow _my fucking problem?!_

So there I was, trying to figure out what to say in order to avoid being fired—

Trying to decide if I actually _wanted_ to keep my job—

In the meantime, I fished for more details, and was relieved to find out that the dean didn't seem to realize—or maybe she just didn't care—that this whole argument was over the difference between black power salute and a white one.

M— and his friends' main complaint was that I never listened to them.

I never let them talk.

 _Are you fucking kidding me?_

Then the dean told me P— confirmed their story. She said that P— _was on their side_. Which is crazy, because P— is black.

So then I was angry at P—, which isn't at all fair, because who am I to put her on the spot like that, like it's her job to represent the woke civil right sentiments of all blacks everywhere. Like I want her to _perform_ her blackness for me.

The dean told me that M— feels like I'm picking on him.

"He talks all of the time," I told her. "He and his friends talk more than anyone else."

But then I remembered G— and A—, who are in a different period. I remembered how they would complain about me trying to shut them up. Which is such utter bullshit.

I guess it's true though: White boys have to fill all of the space all of the time. Any attempt to level the field feels like oppression to them.

In the beginning of the semester, I would always make an effort to compliment a student whenever I asked them to let another people answer a question. I'd say: "I know that you know the answer" or "You have really valuable insights but"—

But _can you just shut the fuck up so that someone else can talk?_

 _Someone who isn't a white guy, maybe?_

I got _tired_. I mean, how many times do I have to pat them on the fucking head?

So yeah, I stopped assuaging their egos every time I wanted them to show some fucking courtesy to their fellow classmates. I stopped complimenting them.

I thought that they were smart enough to understand that the compliment was implied. I thought they understood that me asking them to give someone else a chance didn't mean that I thought they were wasting my time.

I thought that they understood.

But now these poor little white boys were apparently running around with their feelings all hurt.

And here I am, at two o'clock in the morning. Unable to sleep. Sick to my fucking stomach. So angry and so hurt.

Because M— and his little friends are fucking racists and I don't know what to do about it.

Because I'm so fucking sick of having this argument and making zero fucking headway.

Because I _like_ M—.

I _like_ that fucking little kid.

And he's just broken my heart.

I don't know what to do.

I want to shake him. I want to shake all of them.

I want to ask them what the fuck they think they're doing. I want to know how they got these ideas.

Because white power isn't a thing. It's not like being Irish or French. It's an identity built solely on race. On the notion that your skin color makes you better than someone else.

It's not the same thing as black power, if only because being black in America isn't the same thing as being white, because most blacks can't say that they're South African or Nigerian or anything else— _because that was taken from them_. Their identities, their names, their religions, their language, autonomy over their very bodies, these were all TAKEN FROM THEM.

And I TOLD THEM.

They had just read a passage from Alex Haley's _Autobiography of Malcolm X_ on THIS VERY TOPIC.

I don't know what to do.

I can just see the conversation in my head if I try to argue with them. I'm running through all of the possible scenarios, over and over again, on a loop, because I know what they'll say.

They'll keep changing the goalposts.

Whataboutism at its fineness.

And I can't—

I just can't handle this.

It's too fucking much.

I can't—I just can't _hear_ them say one more FUCKING crazy thing.

I can't listen to them try to defend it—

 _They'll just dig in their heels even more._

By the morning, I've come up with a brand new lesson plan. I've only had two hours of sleep— _bad_ sleep—but I know what I'm going to do.

I've found these games for them to play that force them to see the effects of poverty cycles. The have to make ends meet on minimum wage, with all of the bullshit people have to go through in life.

It's by way of analogy again—like with the Stonewall Riots and the Greensboro lunch counter sit-ins—I'm trying to make them understand the whole point of systematic economic and political disenfranchisement through the most basic lens.

And when they're all done playing those games, I'm going to give them the statistics. I'm going to read out the results from all of the studies showing how blacks are the only demographic who haven't seen an overall increase in income since 2000; how whites are less likely to express anxiety at the spectacle of non-whites in pain than whites; how whites are more likely to do illegal drugs than Latinos or blacks, but are less likely to go to jail for just that; how black men get longer prison sentences than white men for the same crimes; how whites habitually view black children as older and less innocent than white children; how—

They don't even give me a chance to get started.

"White power," E— says under his breath as he sits down at his desk. "White power."

He says it over and over again before the bell rings, and as I'm taking attendance.

"Do you want to talk about something?" I ask him.

"No," he says. And he stops.

I apologize to the class then. I say that I'm sorry if I made anyone feel like they couldn't talk or express an opinion. I say that I'm just trying to make sure _everyone_ has a chance to talk.

I know that they can hear it in my voice. The way that it's shaking.

I'm so angry and hurt.

 _Not_ because they complained about me to the dean of students.

(Though, yeah, that fucking sucked.)

It's because I'm so utterly betrayed by their _blatant_ fucking failure to understand why white power is so utterly anathema to everything decent and good and civilized.

I feel like such a waste. Like everything I've done the entire time I've been here has been a fucking waste of time.

I explain the games and hand out the materials. Then I sit down at my desk to eat chocolate. One piece of chocolate after another. Self-medicating.

I'm a little gratified when I overhear M— complain about yet another setback while he's playing one of the games.

For the most part, everyone in this town is poor. M—'s one of the exceptions. His father is the mayor.

If _he_ can get it—if he can figure out for himself that these problems are part of a cycle and they haven't gone away—

I even tell myself that it's ok if they don't get it right now. Maybe they'll get it ten years from now. Maybe they'll think back on this memory and realize that they were wrong.

(Looking back on my own high school experience, I know that I wish that I'd been nicer to some of my teachers, given them a little more respect.)

But I also know that this is me just trying to make myself feel better right now. I'm just trying to give myself hope.

I'm not making any difference here at all.

When they're all done with the games, I read out the statistics.

That's right, I _read_ them out. No discussion. Because I don't _give a fuck_ what they think. _These are facts_. These statistics aren't subject to fucking question.

At this point, in my other classes, I asked them if they saw any of bias in their own lives and what they thought could be done to fix the problem. But I just can't. Not with them.

So to fill the rest of the period, I make them watch MLK's _I have a dream speech_. It's just a clip from YouTube. Anyone can see it anytime they want to.

I notice one of the students taking out her phone and something inside of me curdles.

Because _of course_ , now that I let them watch a fucking movie, they can't keep off of their fucking phones long enough to actually watch.

I don't even have it in me to tell her to put it away.

But then I realize that she's using her phone to take a photo of MLK speaking.

I stare at her snapping the picture and I wonder why the fuck she would take a picture of a video that she could see any time she wanted to.

It seems so fucking stupid.

Why do a thing like that?

At the same time—

I realize just why she took it.

And I feel a little better for just a minute.

Like I'm not a complete joke.

Because I did something worthwhile for once, in making them watch a video that honestly matters to at least one of them.

But then I remember where I am and who these kids are and what they think of me.

And I still mostly feel like shit.

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

 _A person can_ promise _himself that he'll change. He can_ tell _himself that he's different._

 _There's always a chance that it doesn't take, though. In fact, it's likely to fall through, isn't it?_

 _People don't change._

 _And Swan just made it so difficult for Edward._

 _She was back to her sullen old self. She only condescended to visit him in the hospital because he took a fall in the hallway trying to get to her room._

 _She said that she didn't like it there. She said_ that _was why she'd been avoiding him._

 _But he had his suspicions._

 _The place_ was _crawling with press. The story of two teenagers surviving a plane crash for weeks in the middle of nowhere was apparently a big story._

 _So Edward understood why Swan would be nervous._

 _Then she tried to take the Cullens off of the list of people allowed to visit her._

" _Why would you do that?" Edward demanded, having talked a pretty young candy striper into pushing his bed into Swan's room._

 _Swan was glaring at him with her arms crossed over her chest. And she was clearly pissed at the candy striper who'd slipped back out of the room after leaving Edward._

" _I got tired of them gushing all over me," Swan said._

" _They're just happy that you're alive."_

" _They don't even know me."_

" _Well, they're grateful to you for helping me." Edward shook his head, amazed at her obtuseness. "Besides, they know that Billy can't make it here. They're trying to pick up the slack."_

" _They're not my parents," she snapped._

" _They know that. They just care."_

 _She shrugged. "Maybe I don't want them caring."_

 _Narrowing his eyes, Edward studied her. "What do you mean?"_

" _I mean that I wish people would stay out of my life. All of these doctors and nurses. The police questioning us, too!"_

" _They just want to know what happened with the plane."_

"I _didn't cause it to crash."_

" _They know that."_

 _Swan huffed and looked away. "I just can't wait until I get out of this place."_

 _Annoyed, Edward snorted. "Yeah, I'm sure you're desperate to get back to your life of ignoring everyone else."_

 _After a minute, he said, "You know, you never did tell me why you brought those pills."_

 _Looking back at him, Swan stuck her chin up. "What do you mean?"_

" _I don't know. Just, you don't seem like an addict to me. You never had any withdrawals."_

 _She gazed at him._

" _You know what?" he asked. "I think you brought those pills with you because you were planning to kill yourself all along."_

 _She scoffed. "Please."_

" _I bet you came on this Spring Break intending to kill yourself."_

" _Whatever."_

" _Why_ did _you come?" Edward shook his head. "I always wondered why you came. It couldn't have been because you wanted to hang out with us. I just figured that you wanted to be a little do-gooder and put in some volunteer hours. But now—"_

" _Now what?"_

 _Now, Edward had no intention of letting Swan get another chance to hurt herself._

 _He told his parents that she had tried to kill herself._

 _Swan argued that Edward had hallucinated the suicide attempt. She knew all about the fever dreams and his hallucinations about waking up in the hospital with her lost off in the wilderness._

 _Fortunately, Edward's parents—and more importantly, Swan's doctors—didn't buy it._

 _She was forced to undergo a psych eval and very closely monitored._

 _And once she and Edward were released from the hospital, Swan was kept under close supervision by the Cullens during the trip back to Forks. Then, much to her dismay, Billy Black and the Edward's parents struck up a close friendship. What was worse, in addition to individual counseling sessions, Bella was forced to endure joint sessions with Edward._

" _We've gone through a traumatic experience together," he told her. "Besides, you wouldn't want to set back my recovery, would you?"_

 _She glowered at him._

 _By that point, the school year was over and Bella and Edward had to make up their work with a tutor. Since they had many of the same classes, they also shared a tutor._

 _Billy's son, Jacob, would give Bella a lift to the Cullens' every day so that she could share class with Edward._

" _Can I copy off of your paper?" Edward would ask her._

" _I hate you," she'd say._

" _But I'm going to invite you to a party," he said one day after she rebuked him for a particularly annoying comment._

" _Why would I want to come to a party?" she asked._

" _Because you want to."_

" _No I don't."_

" _You forget, I've read your deepest, darkest secrets," Edward said._

 _The diary—Bella's diary—had been miraculously saved. Edward had been clutching it to his chest when he was rescued, and it was sent with him to the hospital._

" _It's just a poem," Bella told him, recognizing his reference._

"Queenie was a blonde and her age stood still," _Edward said, reciting from memory._

 _Her eyes widening, Bella stared at him._  
"And she danced twice a day in vaudeville.  
Grey eyes.  
Lips like coals aglow.  
Her face was a tinted mask of snow.  
What hips—  
What shoulders—  
What a back she had!  
Her legs were built to drive men mad.

And she did."

 _So Bella agreed to go to the party with Edward._

 _Alas, that party didn't live up to Bella's expectations._

 _It lived_ down _to them._

 _Watching Edward—watching him laugh and joke with all of his friends—Bella felt like a fool. Such a fool._

 _Why had she agreed to come?_

 _Oh, everyone was nice enough to her, the way that people are nice to someone who's mentally defective._

 _They knew that Edward owed her his life. For that reason alone, they were willing to grant her a reprieve for all of her imagined indiscretions—she wasn't, in fact, responsible for Tyler's arrest—and for all of her actual crimes—her long history of obvious disdain for each and every one of them._

 _But she didn't fit in. And it was obvious._

 _Tanya was the worst. Tanya's sneering condescension. Her pitying gaze._

 _And then the way Edward followed Tanya's form across the room. The way he went after her._

 _Bella wouldn't stay. She couldn't stay. Not a moment longer._

 _She set off, in the dark and the rain. She didn't care. She'd hiked miles across a snowy tundra. She could walk home in the rain._

 _In the dark and the rain._

 _She had done it for him. She had trudged across the wilderness for him._

 _Because she couldn't die, not with him depending on her._

 _Not with another person's life hanging in the balance._

 _Noticing the headlights coming up behind her, Bella drew away to the side of the road._

" _Swan!"_

 _Furious that he would follow her out here, Bella turned off into the trees. She'd go through the woods if she had to!_

" _Jesus Christ, Bella!"_

 _She heard the car screeching to a halt behind her._

" _At least slow down," he yelled._

 _She could hear him thrashing through the woods behind her. And enraged to think that he would risk hurting his leg by coming after her, she whirled on him._

" _Why don't you go back to your girlfriend?" she snarled._

" _What girlfriend?"_

" _Don't give me that."_

" _Tanya's not my girlfriend."_

" _Bullshit."_

" _I just wanted to talk to her about—"_

-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-

"… murdered on the University of Maryland's College Park campus on Saturday morning."

My fingers freeze on the radio dial.

 _Did I hear that right?_

No. It's a mistake. I've heard it wrong.

I wait for the deejay to correct himself—or to clarify the story—but he's already moving on to a traffic report.

Fucking _traffic._

I scan the other channels, hoping to hear more details. But, as per fucking usual, the Saturday morning talk shows are doing their best impression of a junior high locker room. Zero content of actual substance.

I'm home for the weekend and I'm out buying supplies for dinner.

It's May. The semester is almost over. I'm almost free of that fucking town and those kids I hate.

And I've been neglecting Edward and my brother. I know that. To try and show them my appreciation, I'm going to cook for once—I'm going to try to make samosas and saag paneer.

I sit in the parking lot of the grocery store for a few minutes, trying different stations. But it's wall-to-wall advertisements and pop music crap. I try my phone, but the signal is weak. I can't get a search to go through.

So I run inside the store and rush through my shopping. I throw stuff into my shopping cart, glancing at the other customers going about their business. They're all acting as if nothing's out of the ordinary.

Don't they know?

Haven't they heard?

How can they act like everything's normal?

 _What am I doing buying the ingredients for a "fancy" dinner when something horrible has just happened?_

Once I'm back in the car, I start scanning stations again as I drive home.

And finally, right after I hit S— Street, the story comes up again.

"Richard Collins III was murdered by a white supremacist on the University of Maryland's College Park campus this morning."

 _What?_

My hands are shaking on the wheel.

"Collins was a recently commissioned officer who was scheduled for graduation this week from Bowie State University."

My vision's blurring—but I can see well enough to check my rearview mirror. I put on my flashers and pull over to the side of the road.

"Collins was stabbed by Sean Urbanski while waiting at a bus stop on campus, after visiting friends."

I'm shaking my head, because this doesn't make any sense. This is _insane._ I don't believe it.

"Sean Urbanski is a member of the Alt Reich Nation Facebook group, which posts racially and sexually offensive content. Investigators are looking into the possibility that this was a hate crime."

The reporter switches over to the weather report then and I'm still just sitting there, on the side of the road, my stomach churning and my hands shaking and my vision a tunnel.

That's _my_ university. _My_ campus. The same one where they found swastikas a few months ago.

 _How is this possible?_

I _told_ them. I _told_ them to do something.

 _Why didn't they do something?_

I just—

I _can't._

I'm _so_ fucking done with this.

This isn't my country. I don't recognize it. They've _taken_ it and _warped_ it.

But then, a little voice inside of me says: _**It's always been this way. You just didn't see.**_

No! I refuse to believe—

I _know_ it wasn't perfect, but—

It's _their_ fault! That town full of racist rednecks where I'm stuck teaching—

It's _their_ fault. _They_ did this.

 _They_ made this happen.

I hate them so very much for this—

The way that they blame their problems on other people.

 _I_ made it, after all. I pulled myself out of that trailer park. Poverty didn't stop _me_ from learning—

But that voice inside of me objects again: _**You're a liar.**_

I'm not a liar. I didit all by myself. I worked my ass off studying and working and going to school at the same time—

 _ **She**_ **made** _ **you study**_ , the voice says.

 _She_ , meaning my mother.

So what? So what if my mother made me study, told me that I had no choice but to go to college?

The voice snickers: _**Your district had one of the**_ **best** _ **public school systems in the country**_ **.**

So what? _I_ lived in the poorest neighborhood—

The voice: _**Your father got a job as a janitor at that college so you'd get a free undergraduate degree**_ **.**

And I'm like, so _fucking_ what?

Because I remember the nervous breakdown he had right before my last year at the school.

The voice: _**And what happened? Do you remember? The university gave you a free ride your senior year, even though your father wasn't working there anymore.**_

I scoff. The university did it out of _guilt_. They gave me a free year out of _guilt_.

They were afraid that my father would sue.

The voice: _**Universities don't give away free rides like that. They just don't.**_

But I fucking _earned_ it. With my grades—

 _And_ with everything that I put up with from my father—his _abuse_ —I fucking _earned_ it. You have no _fucking_ idea what I put up with—

The voice: _**Your parents destroyed themselves giving you a better life.**_

That's _not_ what happened—

The voice: _**You got EVERYTHING. Your parents had NOTHING left over for your brother!**_

No!

The voice: _**Yes!**_

No!

The voice: _**And then when your brother moved in with you, he had to switch school systems. He was actually better off with your parents! At least, then he was getting a better education.**_

FUCK YOU!

The voice: _**And you used to think—don't deny it—you used to think that blacks got all of the scholarships. You were SO ENVIOUS imagining that blacks could just go to college for free if they wanted to, like it was nothing.**_

I—

The voice: _**You thought it. You did.**_

It's not like that. It's—

Those college books were just full of so many scholarships for blacks—

The voice: _**One scholarship for everyone who was black? Isn't**_ **that** _ **what you thought?**_

I just wanted it so much—I wanted to go to college _so much_. It was a physical ache—

The voice: _**As if were even possible for there to be enough scholarships for every black student out there, the challenges blacks face—A scholarship is the**_ **least** _ **that can be done. Forty acres and a mule. They never got their reparations. Structural inequalities and systematic disenfranchisement—**_

I didn't mean it like that.

The voice: _**You're a limousine liberal.**_

Bullshit! I grew up in a _fucking trailer_! I ate nothing but _canned beans_ for weeks! We had no phone! No electricity, sometimes, because we couldn't pay the bill! Leaking plumbing fixed with duct tape!

The voice: _**You weren't on the streets.**_

My parents made my life a living hell—

The voice: _**They never beat you.**_

You _know_ what they did. You _know—_

The voice: _**Still. They gave you so much**_ **.**

No.

I won't listen to this. I _won't._

Because I won't give my parents any credit.

Because I _hate_ them.

Because I'm still so mad at them.

Mad at what they did to me. Mad at what they did to my brother.

And not just for what the things that they did when I was growing up—

No, I mean for everything they're doing _right now_.

They've _abandoned_ us.

That's right.

First, they wind up in jail. And then when they come out, what do they do? My mother decides to down a couple of whiskey tonics and go for a drive. Bitch is lucky she's the only one who died in the crash.

And my father?

 _My father?_

He just disappears.

That's right. _Up and disappears_.

Abandons my brother and disappears into the wilds like he's a fucking mountain man.

Can you imagine what that's like? Of being so goddamned angry and afraid that my parents are going to take my brother away from me—only for the two of them to abandon us—like we're _nothing_. Like we don't matter. Can you imagine what it's like _hating_ them for that, while at the same time _mourning_ them.

Then, on top of everything, I'm supposed to feel _grateful_ to them? Because yeah, they looked out for me in a way that they never looked out for my brother. They made sure that I got to go to a good school. They made sure that I'd have a better life than they did.

I hate them for it.

 _Fuck them_.

Because I _earned_ this. Everything I have—my education, my learning, my degrees—I _earned_ all of it. And I did it, not _because_ of my parents, but _in spite_ of them.

For that reason alone, I'm better than everyone in that redneck town where I'm working. Because what have they ever accomplished?

 _Fuck_ my parents for taking this—this _superiority_ —from me.

But I didn't pull myself up alone. Even in that trailer park, I didn't fit in. They hated me. Just like they hate me in that town. Because of what my parents gave me. Because they made me different.

I remember my mother, too. "You think you're smarter than me," she'd say. Like she hated me for the education that _she_ gave me.

It's not just my learning, though. I've always enjoyed the currency of my skin color. I've always had that in my favor.

I _want_ to hate the people in that town—I _want_ to be able to judge them.

I _do_ judge them.

But I had advantages they didn't.

Still—

I want to blame them for what's happened to my country.

I wantit to be _their_ fault that Richard Collins III is dead—

I'm just so fucking fucking fucking angry.

Sitting on the side of the road, my head on the steering wheel—

It _has_ to be someone's fault.

The monster who killed him—like that man in Kansas who killed Srinivas Kuchibhotla—they've been _empowered_ by all of this, by everything that's been happening since last November.

And _I_ voted correctly. I did everything that I was supposed to do.

The voice: _**Everything?**_

What else could I have done?

The voice: _**What**_ **did** _ **you do? What did you**_ **really** _ **do?**_

I had the right opinions. I always voted. I _almost_ always voted. I gave to charity. I called the White House—

The voice: _**Once. You called the White House once.**_

I have anxiety. This isn't easy for me.

The voice: _**Oh, anxiety. I'm sure that Richard Collins' spirit will understand.**_

I signed petitions.

The voice: _**You didn't even know the names of your members of Congress.**_

I do now! I know all of their names. I know the names of all of the members of the Cabinet and—

The voice: _**Too late. It's too late.**_

But—

The voice: _**Drawing-room Socialist.**_

It's not too late!

The voice: _**He's dead. Richard Collins III is already dead. It's too late.**_

It's not my fault—

The voice: _**You spent your time daydreaming. You spent your time in books and the past. In things that don't exist.**_

No—I was _so_ busy with work and school.

The voice: _**You had enough time for daydreams.**_

It wasn't like that.

The voice: _**Pretty fairy tales.**_ **Fantasies** _ **. Imagined suffering. Pretend pain. When there's real pain around you. When people are**_ **dying** _ **.**_

But—but—

But I know the voice is right.

Because Richard Collins' blood is on my hands.

The voice: _**So what are you going to do about it?**_

 **AN:**

 **Yes, I know that she's not perfect. That's kind of the point.**

 **The details about Richard Collins III, Srinivas Kuchibhotla, Freddie Gray, the police officers in Harris County, Tamir Rice, the FBI harassing MLK, the Black Panthers, and the swastikas found on the University of Maryland College Park campus are all true. The Slender Man killer is also a real person. Some of the statistics I mentioned can be found in** _ **Slate**_ **4Mar2015 "10 Ways White People are More Racist than They Realize" by Kali Holloway (article originally appeared on Alternet). The classroom scenes are drawn from my experience teaching at a private school in one of the whitest states in the nation (the lack of diversity being accomplished by incarcerating a higher proportion of the black population than any other state). I decided to move this scene to a poor community (I figure somewhere in southern Appalachia) because I couldn't think of a compelling reason to have the main character of** _ **Book of Monsters**_ **teach at a private school in a predominately white district. Other details drawn from my own life include the descriptions of culture shock upon moving to an incredibly white area, the dissonance of growing up in a trailer park in the poorest neighborhood in one of the richest counties in the country, and the bit about the free college ride and its connection to the mental breakdown of a parent. Yes, I really tried to "stick up" a cop when I was sixteen or seventeen. I'm an asshole. Or an idiot. Or both. You can decide.**

 **It's taken me all summer to write about the "white power" incident in the classroom and Richard Collins' death. They both occurred in the same month. My reaction to Collins' death wasn't as extreme as Bella's—I didn't have to pull over to the side of the road—but it took me months to be able to even speak about these two incidents without shaking and almost coming to tears (I almost _never_ cry). Surprisingly (to me), I think that finally speaking about the two incidents at a rally for Heather Heyer was crucial to my "recovery"—in part because I was so convinced that the state I'd moved to didn't give a damn about this issue. Their apathy felt like a physical assault: I felt like I was simultaneously losing my mind and breaking apart, all while still struggling with the cultural shock in living in such an overwhelming white region. Going to the rally and seeing that people actually cared, mattered a great deal to me. I'm talking about this here because if anyone else feels this way, I don't want you to feel like you're alone.**

 **For suggestions on fighting hate, please look up The Southern Poverty Law Center. They have maps showing you hate groups in your area as well as concrete suggestions about what you can do to make a difference.**

 **If you think you're completely free of all racist inclinations, you're lying to yourself. The Harvard Implicit Bias Test is a real thing. Check it out.**

 **The lines of poetry that were cited in this chapter are drawn from Yeat's** _ **On a Picture of a Black Centaur,**_ **Chidiock Tichborne's** _ **My prime of youth is but a frost of cares**_ **, Sidney Keyes'** _ **The Wilderness,**_ **Forugh Farrokhzad's** _ **In the Land of Dwarfs**_ **translated by Girdhard Tikku, a line from** **Joseph Glanvill that's quoted in Edgar Allan Poe's** _ **Ligeia**_ **, Tennyson's** _ **Ulysses,**_ **T. S. Eliot's** _ **The Waste Land,**_ **the** _ **Prophecy of the Völva**_ **, Tennyson's** _ **The Stolen Child**_ **and** **Joseph Moncure March's** _ **The Wild Party**_ **. I memorized many of the cited verses of my own accord when I was a teenager. So I think this Bella's fondness for this literature is believable. (Alas, I don't remember the name of the person who translated the version of the** _ **Prophecy of the Völva**_ **that I memorized all of those years ago and cited above.)**

 **In other news, I am still working on** _ **Crash**_ **, which is obviously a reworking of the "fantasy" in the above chapter. (Note:** _ **Crash**_ **will diverge from the outline provided above.) My apologies for the delay. But having just seen the ads for** _ **The Mountain between Us,**_ **I am ever so grateful that I started posting** _ **Crash**_ **months ago, long before I knew that this movie was a thing.**

 **The EPOV of** _ **Book of Monsters**_ **will post shortly—both an abridged and an unabridged version. (They were in the works before I started** _ **Crash**_ **and I wanted to "clear the decks" so that I could really devote myself to** _ **Crash.**_ **)**

 **Thank you for reading.**


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